Reform UK warns it would scrap £60m pipeline planned for underneath Derbyshire

They say it’s a vanity project to meet ‘mad’ targets

The Reform UK leader of Derbyshire County Council, Alan Graves, has added his name to a letter to the private-sector backers of the Peak Cluster Carbon Capture and Storage scheme, stating that a Reform UK government would scrap the project.

The scheme would build a 121-mile underground CO2 pipeline from Derbyshire’s Peak District, past Liverpool, to the Irish Sea.

It’s the brainchild of Derbyshire quarrying and cement firms, which lead the UK’s production of vital building materials – but as a by-product, also produce many tonnes of carbon emissions.

Tarmac, Holcim, Breedon, Buxton Lime and Spirit Energy, working closely with the SEEL Summit Energy Revolution, Progressive Energy and the Government’s National Wealth Fund, form the combined project group.

Of the current £59.6 million project cost, £28.6 million is coming from central Government, with the award made in July 2025, and the rest is being contributed by private firms.

Due to the massive scale of the project, which would take three years to build across four counties, the scheme is to be decided nationally, with local councils merely acting as consultees, alongside residents, interest groups and businesses.

It is hoped the scheme will create 1,200 temporary construction jobs while safeguarding 2,000 existing roles.

But the scheme has encountered opposition in many areas, and the latest letter from Reform UK, also signed by Martin Murray, leader of Staffordshire County Council, and Richard Tice, deputy leader of Reform UK, promises to block all planning applications for the scheme should it get into government.

In the letter, the three argue that the proposed route will “cut through swathes of greenbelt land, desecrating the countryside” and interfere with wildlife sites and Sites of Special Scientific Interest, such as the North Wirral Foreshore.

Branding the proposal a “vanity project”, they also point out that taxpayers will have to pay around £30 million via the National Wealth Fund, claiming that the figure could “balloon astronomically before the project’s completion”.

The proposed 290km long pipeline will take CO2 from the connecting cement and lime plants and quarries to the proposed Morecambe Net Zero carbon storage site beneath the Irish Sea, and is set to pass through Derbyshire, Staffordshire, Cheshire and Merseyside.

The letter states: “Perhaps if this was a genuinely vital project to the UK economy this would be an acceptable trade-off; it’s the Government’s role to make those difficult decisions in the national interest.

“But Peak Cluster only exists to try and meet the mad Net Zero targets brought in under the Conservatives. These are killing off British Industry and have given us the highest industrial energy prices in the developed world.

“The scheme is currently in its pre-application phase, the timelines of the project mean that it’s highly likely there will be a General Election and a new Government before construction commences.

“A Reform UK Government will not feel compelled to deliver pointless Net Zero schemes agreed to by this Labour Government and will withdraw all public backing for the project.

“Any private investment is made at your own risk. You have been warned.”

Speaking in March, Mr Graves said: “This council supports meaningful environmental action, but what we have before us in the Peak Cluster proposal is not that.

“It’s a project that asks our residents, our farmers, our countryside to bear enormous cost and risk for benefits that are distant, uncertain and achieved by far less damaging alternatives.”

Peak Cluster has been approached by Derbyshire Live for comment.