Written question asked by Charles Hendry (Conservative) on Monday, 1 March 2010, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Wednesday, 3 March 2010. It was answered by David Kidney (Labour) on Wednesday, 3 March 2010 on behalf of the Department of Energy and Climate Change.

Natural Gas: Imports

Question: To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change what projection his Department has made of the proportion of UK gas demand that will be met by imports in (a) 2012, (b) 2015 and (c) 2020.

Answer: Projections of net annual UK gas import dependency in (b) 2015 (43 per cent.) and (c) 2020 (45 per cent.) were published in July 2009 in Table 19 of the analytical annex to "The UK Low Carbon Transition Plan" which is (only) available online at"http://www.decc.gov.uk/en/content/cms/publications/lc_trans_plan/lc_trans_plan.aspx"The equivalent estimate for (a) 2012 is 39 per cent. These projections of net annual import dependency are in line with the projections of post-transition plan net UK gas demand and net UK gas production shown in chart 22 of the analytical annex. The Department updates its projections of both UK gas demand and production from time to time so these estimates of future import dependency are subject to revision.

Secondary information