As the plenary sessions were beamed to the nation from the main hall at P&J Live, Aberdeen & Grampian Chamber of Commerce and its partners were busy behind the scenes on behalf of our members making sure that the views of our business community were heard and understood by ministers and civil servants.

This included an opportunity to engage directly with Deputy First Minister John Swinney at a private dinner hosted by Chamber member True North at Maryculter House and a fringe event at the conference on Monday.

The joint AGCC and Robert Gordon University sponsored event - Our Mission: Just Transition - was chaired by Gillian Martin, MSP for Aberdeenshire East, and brought together an expert panel comprising: Michael Matheson MSP, the Cabinet Secretary for Net Zero, Energy and Transport; Professor Paul de Leeuw, director of RGU's Energy Transition Institute and lead author of Making the Switch; Donella Beaton, RGU vice principal for economic development; and Fergus Mutch, the Chamber's policy advisor.

The importance of the topic was reflected in Monday's fringe event being standing room only!

At the session, the Cabinet Secretary was giving nothing away on the identities of the successful bidders for the two green freeports to be set up in Scotland.

Just last week, there were reports that the freeports winners had been decided and would be named imminently.

Tax incentives

Five bids were made for the two special economic zones north of the border, which are being created under a scheme agreed by the Scottish and UK governments. The winners will be able to offer tax incentives and lower tariffs for areas around airports, seaports and rail terminals.

Among the bids was one from North East Scotland Green Freeport, which has plans to create 32,000 jobs, so there is obviously much interest in this part of Scotland in how the local bid has fared.

But despite clearly hearing the importance of and strength of support for this region's bid, the Cabinet Secretary would not be drawn on the outcome before the official announcement. He did, however, highlight the importance of collaboration among all of the bid consortiums and their related port and harbour infrastructure if Scotland is to achieve its net-zero and energy transition ambitions.

Mr Matheson also set out the Scottish Government's objective that Scotland becomes a global energy hub through a managed transition to a greener future. He highlighted the ScotWind licensing programme that comprises 28GW of new offshore renewables projects - 70% of which are within 100 nautical miles of Aberdeen - and also the substantial supply-chain opportunities this will provide.

The Cabinet Secretary wants to see Scotland taking the lead in its manufacturing capability and capacity, where technology developed in Scotland can be exported across the world.

Prof de Leeuw then presented the headlines from the recent Making the Switch report by Robert Gordon University which came out in May and says the energy industry in the north-east is at a crossroads. The report sets out a range of workforce scenarios that could unfold over the coming years. Each depends on the degree to which the north-east can exploit its existing energy ecosystem and realise its ambitions in the transition arena.

Jobs offshore

The data shows that, currently in the north-east, 45,000 people are employed in the offshore energy sector. It looks at four scenarios and the worst of these, "regional decline", sees this figure fall by an eye-watering 17,000 by 2030. That is the price of getting this wrong.

The best-case scenario - global Energy Hub status - forecasts direct employment in the sector growing to 54,000, with over 60% of the jobs in renewable energy. A remarkable shift inside a decade. These low-carbon jobs are not available at scale yet, but with the right support, investment and training they can be in the near future.

The session ended with the chamber's Fergus Mutch commending the Scottish Government for yesterday's announcement of an energy skills summit and initial funding awards from the Just Transition Fund, but he laid down several challenges to the Cabinet Secretary.

These included rejecting a further windfall tax as it would deter investment in the energy transition, the need to grow our population and workforce to grow the economy, and the requirement for government and business to work more closely on shared priorities.

And, with the First Minister's choice of language making headline news on Sunday, it was suggested that the Scottish Government should switch narrative from speaking about "oil and gas" in the negative, to describing our valued "energy sector" in more positive terms to give confidence to workers and encourage North Sea investment.

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