Building confidence in delivery: lessons from Aspect’s energy leaders' webinar

Watch the webinar

Watch Aspect’s webinar, The Engagement Gap: What policymakers really think about industry, infrastructure and delivery, held following the launch last month of our research paper, From Ambition to Alignment. The research explored policymakers’ confidence in progress towards Scotland’s energy transition objectives, and what they need to hear from industry to strengthen that confidence.

In this webinar, Peter Smyth, Aspect’s External Affairs Director, kicked off with a presentation on the research findings before our CEO Andrew McCallum led a panel discussion with Susie Lind, Partner at CMS and Co-chair of Scottish Renewables; Paul McLennan MSP, MSP for East Lothian and Chair of the East Lothian Energy Forum; and Gavin Roberts, Communications Manager at Spirit Energy and Net Zero Morecambe.

The clearest conclusion was also the most practical: the engagement gap is not a lack of contact between industry and policymakers. There is plenty of contact. The gap is between interaction and usefulness.

If engagement does not help policymakers understand what is deliverable, what is constrained, who benefits, who is affected and what decisions are needed, it is unlikely to improve confidence. And confidence is now one of the conditions of delivery.

Why confidence matters now

There remains broad support for the objectives of the energy transition. The difficulty is that support for the destination doesn’t remove anxiety about the routes we’re taking across the UK.

Grid capacity, planning and consenting, policy stability, institutional capacity, skills, supply chain readiness and local consent are no longer background delivery issues. They are central to how policymakers judge the credibility of projects and the sector as a whole.

This is a different environment from one in which industry can rely on high-level arguments about net zero, economic growth or energy security. Those arguments still matter, but they aren’t enough. A policymaker may support the energy transition in principle while questioning whether a particular project is deliverable, whether the benefits will be felt locally, and whether industry is bringing solutions or simply escalating asks.

So, the next phase of the transition will be judged less by the strength of the ambition than by confidence in the practical route to delivery.

What useful engagement looks like

Drawing from the new research paper, Peter explained why the answer isn’t necessarily more frequent engagement. It’s sharper engagement that matters.

Policymakers can’t do much with generalised concerns, broad statements of support or familiar lists of barriers. They need specifics: what’s happening, where the constraint sits, what decision is needed, where the trade-offs are, and what industry is proposing as a workable answer.

That requires discipline. Engagement should be concise without being simplistic, evidence-led without being overloaded, and honest about the pressures on the people being engaged.

Ministers, officials, MSPs, MPs and councillors are dealing with crowded agendas. Every project may be urgent to its promoter, but it is one of many competing priorities for the decision maker.

One of the strongest tests for industry is whether it can “make your project an easy one to support”. That won’t mean stripping out complexity or pretending there are no downsides. 

As Gavin explained, it means explaining the project in terms that connect clearly to public policy objectives and local priorities.

The same project may matter to national government because of decarbonisation or energy security; to local government because of jobs, infrastructure and services; and to communities because of disruption, affordability and long-term legacy. Good engagement understands those differences and prepares accordingly.

Why local value has to be credible

Gavin Roberts put it in simple terms: “Make your project an easy one to support.” Indeed, local value and stakeholder alignment was a stand-out theme in the discussion.

Industry often talks about jobs, investment and economic benefit. But the language can become too broad to be persuasive. Large numbers invite scepticism if not supported by detail. 

Communities and local representatives want to know where the jobs will be, who can access them, whether they’re temporary or permanent, how local suppliers can compete, and what the project will mean for the area over time.

This matters because many, if not most communities experience the impacts of infrastructure before they experience the benefits. Roadworks, more construction traffic, visual change and uncertainty can arrive years before the full economic or energy system benefit is visible.

If industry wants local confidence, it needs to make local value feel real.

That means using actual projects, local supply chain examples, skills pathways, community benefit models and evidence of long-term economic impact. It also means being willing to discuss affordability and household pressures where those are part of the public conversation, rather than assuming that national energy arguments will land locally.

The most credible local value propositions are not simply announced. They are shaped with local institutions and communities. Co-production may take longer, but it is more likely to create benefits that people recognise as relevant to them.

Why coordination matters across the sector

Individual projects need strong engagement strategies, but the sector also needs a stronger collective story.

Many parts of Scotland are not dealing with one project in isolation. They are dealing with multiple developments, overlapping timelines and cumulative impacts. From a developer’s perspective, each project has its own rationale. From a community or policymaker’s perspective, the experience can feel layered and complex. 

Trade bodies, clusters, developer forums and local partnerships can help industry explain how individual projects fit into a wider delivery picture. They can also help avoid fragmented engagement, where several organisations approach the same audiences with different messages, different asks and little sense of how their projects interact. As Paul McLennan, describing the impact of the East Lothian Energy Forum told the webinar, “communication with all stakeholders is key.”

Better coordination doesn’t remove the need for individual companies to make their own case. Yet it can help policymakers and communities understand the wider opportunity: the relationship between projects, the role of supply chains, the pressure on grid and planning, and the cumulative local benefit that could be created if delivery is joined up.

A sector that can align around common constraints, practical solutions and shared opportunities is more likely to be heard than one that only arrives project by project.