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New property will be installed with solar panels

Tuesday, June 23rd, 2009

Solar panels should be a fundamental part of all future housing stock built in the UK, the National Energy Foundation (NEF) believes.

The organisation, which helps homes and businesses to reduce their carbon emissions by pursuing energy efficiency measures, also called for new residences to be better insulated to reduce energy consumption.

A spokesperson for the NEF said that biomass could also be a “significant” technology for helping to lower emissions tied to the nation’s energy consumption, but suggested that it is limited by how much feedstock can be grown.

“Solar is an infinite quantity,” he added. “Every single property that is built in the UK, if it doesn’t have solar panels on it then I ask, ‘Why?’”

His comments came after research from UK Climate Projections warned that temperatures in Britain could rise by as much as two degrees C by 2050.

Original Source: The Low Carbon Economy

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Tags:national energy foundation, renewable energy, solar panels, uk energy
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Why nuclear is not the UK’s energy answer

Tuesday, January 6th, 2009

The UK government’s enthusiasm for the construction of nuclear power stations is based on a May 2007 consultation document published by the Department of Trade and Industry (now BERR). This paper argued that nuclear offered a financially viable way of generating electricity, broadly competitive with fossil fuels. It correctly pointed out that the cost of nuclear energy is largely determined by how much a plant costs to build, not by uranium prices or by the price of disposing of nuclear waste.

Since the government’s paper, nuclear power has suffered two huge blows. First, the pound has declined in value against the euro. This makes the core components of a nuclear power station more expensive as they are priced in the European currency. Second, the construction of the new nuclear power station in Finland has descended almost into farce as costs have ballooned and progress has slowed. The Finnish power station is much the more advanced of the two new nuclear plants currently under construction in Europe. If Finland is any guide, nuclear power is far more expensive than anybody expected.

At the time of the 2007 government report, the potential operators of UK nuclear power stations estimated that the costs of running a plant would be less than £30 per megawatt hour, or considerably les than half the costs they are now likely to experience. Those electricity companies who so enthusiastically promoted nuclear power to the UK government would now be unable to make money at today’s power prices. In fact, they would lose hundreds of millions of pounds a year at each power station that they opened.

So will the nuclear ambitions die? We don’t know. The companies could invest in the expectation that power prices will rise substantially over the next few years. Or they could assume that the pound/euro exchange rate will revert to about €1.50/£1. Both are risky assumptions when considering a £5bn bet. Unless the construction of new stations is guaranteed by the UK state, nuclear construction will not take place in the UK at Finnish prices or current exchange rates. It would even be cheaper to build coal-fired power stations with carbon capture and storage.

The fall in the value of the pound also adversely affects the price of not just nuclear but also of other power generation technologies tied to the euro. Wind turbine prices, for example, have risen in price. The change in the exchange rate will hold back the development of many different types of low-carbon technologies. On the other hand, it provides an added incentive for electricity generation from tidal or wave generators, whose costs are partly denominated in pounds rather than euros.

Original Source: The Guardian

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Tags:nuclear energy, Solar Panel News, uk energy, uk energy prices
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UK energy blackouts warning

Friday, November 14th, 2008

UK Energy experts asked by BBC News warn the UK could face an unacceptable risk of major blackouts in less than 10 years unless policy is improved.

They said the government has dithered for too long over policies vital to energy security and climate security.

But they added that forecasts of an imminent power crisis were far-fetched.

The possible energy gap is being created because of the impending closure before 2015 of nine of our major coal and oil-powered plants.This is due to an EU directive on acid rain. The issue is compounded by the closure of four ageing nuclear plants during the same period.

We do not claim our questionnaire of 30 experts is definitive. But its findings do help to map out the scale of the huge challenge facing the new secretary of energy and climate change.

Experts were, for example, asked: “Under current policies there is an unacceptable risk of major blackouts in the next 10 years?” A total of 13 agreed, nine disagreed, six were undecided and three gave no answer.

Some of the experts surveyed in our questionnaire said any short-term energy gap would be filled by burning gas, which undermines our ambitions on climate change.

Another option would be to lobby the EU to keep the coal stations open, which is also harmful to the climate and, experts say, is a case of throwing good money after bad.

But others said there was an unacceptable risk of blackouts as key elements of policy appeared paralysed or compromised.

Of the 31 experts who took part in our questionnaire, there was a feeling that the government’s long-term ambitions on nuclear won’t be achieved due to a lack of industrial capacity.

And many warn that government renewables targets are unlikely to be hit thanks to a combination of a lack of political will and engineering challenges for offshore wind.

The experts demanded much more urgent action on carbon capture and storage from coal, on which the government is due to make a decision soon.

They also said the UK had to move much more quickly to improve storage of gas in depleted gas fields.

Original Source: BBC News

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Tags:energy news, uk energy, uk energy blackouts
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UK energy bills increasing at twice the rate of EU

Wednesday, November 5th, 2008

The figures, which show UK bills have risen more than in almost any other developed nation, will once again raise the question about continental energy companies “picking the pocket” of British consumers. Four of the six biggest gas and electricity firms in the UK are European-owned.

According to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development – a club of the world’s 30 richest nations – energy prices in the UK have increased by 29.7 per cent over the last year.

This is twice the rate of the European average and compares to 14 per cent in France and 12.2 per cent in Germany. Only Norwegian consumers are suffering from a higher level of energy inflation.

Ed Mayo, chief executive officer of the Government’s new super-watchdog Consumer Focus said: “The UK energy consumer is being clobbered faster and harder than those in Europe. Other countries may be doing more to keep their prices down and we should learn from them. The UK has a relatively free market, but the freedom to cut prices in the early years seems now to be the freedom to raise prices with impunity.

“Of course, those least able to afford it suffer most.”

The data comes less than a week after British Gas ruled out cuts in customer gas bills any time soon, claiming that wholesale gas prices remained too high for it to countenance such a move.

Energy experts point out that British consumers suffer more than their European neighbours because of both its reliance on the gas market and it lack of storage capacity. France, for instance, derives 37 per cent of its energy from its nuclear power stations, meaning it is less reliant on the volatile global gas price.

Britain also has invested far less in gas storage capacity, which means it is less easy for this country to buy gas when it is cheap and store it for the winter.

There is enough storage to supply the country with gas for just 13 days, compared with 99 days in Germany and 122 in France.

Householders have been hit by spiralling inflation – currently at 5.2 per cent – as well as rising bills.

A spokesman for the Energy Retailers Association (ERA) insisted that European companies were not “ripping off” their British customers.

Npower and e.on are German owned, while EDF is French and Scottish Power Spanish. The only two major companies that are still British owned are British Gas and Scottish & Southern Energy.

The spokesman for ERA said: “What the OECD’s figures fail to demonstrate is that British customers have enjoyed historically very low prices compared to Europe and indeed the rest of the world. Primarily this is due to us having our own vast reserves of natural gas in the North Sea and not being exposed to global prices in the same way as we are now.

“We are no longer an energy island. With increased demand from growing economies such as India and China, the prices we now pay for our energy are more vulnerable to fluctuations across the world,” she said.

The most up-to-date figures from Ofgem, the regulator, do suggest that British consumers enjoy slightly lower gas prices than the rest of Europe, while our electricity bills are in line with out neighbours.

However, these figures are from the end of last year, since when annual gas bills have increased in the UK by £277 on average to hit £834 – an increase of nearly 50 per cent.

Joint gas and electricity bills – dual fuel – have climbed from £912 at the start of the year to £1,303.

Scott Byrom, utilities manager at personal finance website MoneySupermarket.com, said: “UK consumers are going to be upset to see customer bills in Europe rise far less quickly. The Government needs to address the issue of lack of storage and make some serious investment.”

Original Source: The Telegraph

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Tags:energy news UK, high energy pricing, uk energy, uk energy price rises
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UK at the mercy of Russia

Thursday, October 30th, 2008

Yesterday, a “highly placed source” in Moscow was reported as saying the Kremlin intends to turn off the oil export pipeline to the EU on Monday, so great is Russian ire about the rhetoric in Brussels and warships in the Black Sea. If this is true, we are entering a whole new ball game in what has come to be called “energy security”. Even if the report proves false, the west should be on red alert about energy export weaponry.

If eight companies across a broad spectrum of UK industry had warned, five years ago, that a ruinous credit crunch would hit the global economy this year, might the government have taken the warning seriously? Might UK leadership in damage limitation have been proactive, rather than reactive? Could a softer landing and a faster recovery have been possible as a result?

Today, eight British companies are warning of a ruinous oil crunch five years from now. We warn that the global peak of oil production will arrive unexpectedly early, resulting in not just a global energy crisis, but potentially the withholding of exports by oil producers and energy famine in oil-importing countries. Previously unimaginable policy interventions in financial markets have suddenly become imperative, and similar interventions in energy markets today may be worth their weight in gold tomorrow, in terms of economic and social damage avoided, especially as this would also help tackle climate change.

The prevailing oil industry view, echoed by the government, is that there are well over a trillion barrels of proved reserves, and several trillions more in tar sands. In a world burning just over 30bn barrels a year, that means decades of supply before we need worry. But peak oil happens when flow-rate capacity coming onstream from oil discoveries fails to exceed declining flow-rate capacity from depletion of existing reserves. Peak oil is as much a problem of flow rates as it is of reserves. In our report, the consulting editor of Petroleum Review – a flagship oil-industry journal – shows how the flow rates from reported discoveries will drop below depletion rates no later than 2013, and possibly a good deal earlier.

As for tar sands, operators have to melt the tar. This is far from easy, and is far slower than lifting liquid crude out of the ground. Easy oil is being depleted by at least 3.5m barrels a day of capacity each year, and seven years from now the oil industry won’t be able to squeeze more than 2.5m barrels of capacity from the tar sands, even if all goes to plan and the industry isn’t reined in because mining tar sands creates huge greenhouse gas emissions. Think of global oil reserves as a water tank: if the tap is faulty, you won’t get enough water out. We fear the oil tap is faulty.

But, some will say, demand has been falling fast since oil hit $147, and that will head off the problem. It is true that the transport sector is changing, and it shows the scope we have for cutting global energy demand and changing supply if we try. But there are problems with relying on this market mechanism.

First, continuing growth in demand in China and India is likely to drown out any reduction in demand from structural changes in the west. Second, the oil industry has – almost incomprehensibly – been investing less in exploration in recent years. Too much of the vast profit we saw from BP earlier this week goes on share buybacks. Third, the industry is relying on aged oilfields, aged infrastructure and an aged workforce just at the time when oilfields are becoming more difficult to find and are taking ever longer — sometimes more than a decade — to bring onstream even when found. Fourth, the oil- and gas-producing nations have massive and growing infrastructure programmes that increasingly cut into their scope for export. Fifth, we worry that Opec has been subject to the same irrational exuberance about delivery capacity as the international oil companies have been.

If we accelerate the green industrial revolution, we believe we can soften the blow of the oil crunch, set up the recovery and get out of oil dependence surprisingly quickly. We hope industry and government can plan for an industrial green new deal, starting now.

Original Source: The Guardian

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Tags:uk energy, uk energy new, uk energy supplies, uk gas
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UK energy supply has entered into terminal decline

Tuesday, October 28th, 2008

In recent years, the UK has become increasingly dependent on natural gas as its primary energy source. This strategy may soon be found to be based upon poor assumptions/perceptions regarding development of domestic and neighbouring natural gas reserves and, in general, regional and global supply capabilities.

1. UK marketable nat gas production (also gross) peaked in 2000 close to 110 Gcm/a.
2. During the last three years, UK nat gas production has declined at an annual rate of 8 – 10 %, which many energy analysts expect will continue.
3. Nat gas constituted more than 38 % of the UK primary energy consumption in 2007.
4. Several analyses expect UK to import 80 % of their nat gas consumption by 2020.
5. UK was a net exporter of nat gas for a brief period.

In 2007, more than 38 % of the UK’s primary energy consumption came from nat gas. Of the EU/OECD countries, only Italy has a higher portion of nat gas consumption. In comparison, the USA gets 25 % of its primary energy consumption from natural gas; France, 15 %; and Germany, 24 %.

In general, high nat gas usage is primarily found among countries with huge nat gas reserves like Russia, where nat gas amounted to more than 57 % of primary energy production in 2007. Russia is the world’s largest exporter of nat gas and second largest exporter of oil, so this high domestic usage frees up oil for export. Since oil generates more income than nat gas, based on units of energy exported, this approach maximizes export revenue.

The UK and Continental Europe have both benefitted from the bidirectional Interconnector that since 1998 has allowed for increased flexibility in nat gas supplies. Due to the decline in UK indigenous supplies and a tighter supply situation on Continental Europe, the importance of the Interconnector is expected to slowly diminish unless future Russian supplies are shipped through the system to UK.

Nat gas production within EU was on a plateau from 1996 to 2004 and has now entered into terminal decline. Increased nat gas production from Norway (which is not a full EU member) has slowed the decline. The balance of consumption within EU has been secured through increasing imports, primarily from Russia, North Africa and LNG. The diagram above suggests that imports into EU will need to grow quickly, from 200 Gcm/a at present to projected 400 Gcm/a by 2020, to fill the rapidly growing gap between declining supplies and projected growth in consumption.

If projected growth in EU nat gas consumption by 2020 is to be met, it will be necessary to double present imports of 200 Gcm/a from Russia, North Africa and LNG, a challenging task. With the ongoing credit crisis still unfolding, an increase in imports that allows maintenance of present EU consumption levels may turn out to be a major accomplishment.

As of 2007, 25 % of EU’s nat gas consumption was imported from Russia. Russian nat gas exports to the EU grew substantially after the completion of pipelines between Western Siberia and Europe by the mid 80’s.

There are good reasons to believe that the Russians (meaning Gazprom) planned their exports to the EU based upon available official data and forecasts from amongst others, EU members and Norway. This is of course a sensible thing to do if the goal is to maximize the profits from the Russian resource base and to optimize the allocation of investment funds. Why invest in expansions of production and infrastructure, if these investments are likely to contribute to an oversupply and a subsequent downward pressure on prices?

Perhaps what is needed is an energy czar. I think it was Matt Simmons who first used the expression “energy czar”, perhaps with a hidden meaning that Russians leaders far better understand the strategic nature of energy than their western counterparts, even though their access to data is not as good.

In 1995 – 1998, the UK exported nat gas to Ireland. In 1998, the Interconnector, the bidirectional pipeline between Bacton in UK and Zeebrugge in Belgium, started to flow. After that, the UK became a moderate exporter of nat gas to Continental Europe.

EU production of natural gas has peaked, and is expected to decline. EU exclusive of UK nat gas production peaked in 1996. Since then, natural gas production has been in a general decline and is expected to continue to decline. Recently Dutch authorities confirmed that their nat gas production is set to decline. These milestones were passed without much attention. For the next several years, projected increases in Norwegian nat gas production are expected to partly offset declines in production in the EU, but the overall production trend is expected to remain downward.

UK has for some years had an important role in securing a unique flexibility with respect to the EU nat gas supply chain. The combined effect of the declining nat gas production in UK and the rest of the EU has already tightened the supply situation for EU (ref the recent price growth within the liberalized UK market), and has the potential to develop into a severe nat gas supply crunch. Such a supply crunch could have cascading effects, and may affect other energy systems. These interrelationships seem to be poorly understood among those responsible for developing energy supply strategies.

Original Source: The Oil Drum

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Tags:energy news UK, high energy price, uk energy
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Why are UK energy bills still going up?

Friday, October 24th, 2008

Oil prices are plunging and the wholesale price of gas and electricity in the UK is trending downwards – so why are our fuel bills still going up?

The answer from the big energy companies – whose unpopularity has now only been eclipsed by the banks – is that it takes time before their lower costs feed into lower bills for consumers.

Suppliers like British Gas or E.ON UK either have to buy in electricity and gas from the wholesale markets to supply their customers, or they get it from their own power plants and from long-term gas supply contracts.

These utilities treat each division separately – so for example, E.ON UK has to buy power from its own generation arm. When it costs more for its plants to generate power, these get passed onto its retail arm, which in turn raises the price its customers pay. The opposite should happen when costs fall. Companies say it can take six months for these changes to feed through to customers. This means retail prices should start coming down soon.

Fair enough, in theory. But there is so little financial information or transparency about suppliers’ activities that it is hard to track their real costs. The publicly tradeable wholesale gas and electricity market is no longer an accurate measure of the ‘real’ cost of these commodities for energy companies as so little is traded in this way: most suppliers get their gas and electricity from within their own group. No-one knows what their real costs are because companies do not have to release the information. EDF’s impending takeover of British Energy – a standalone company providing about a fifth of the UK’s power – is another nail in the coffin of wholesale energy markets in the UK. Critics can be forgiven for not being inclined to take the companies at their word when they insist that bills will come down eventually.

Gordon Brown jumped onto the anti-energy company bandwagon this month when he called on suppliers to cut bills as their costs come down. It doesn’t help that many suppliers are only now notifying their customers by letter of the price rises they announced in August because of higher oil and gas prices.

So you can’t blame consumers for being confused – and angry. Companies need to open their books to explain what their real costs and profits are. But with four of the Big Six suppliers foreign owned, it’s especially hard for anyone – journalist, analyst or Government – to measure the flow of profit and investment between operations in different countries.

There was uproar when it emerged recently that French customers pay less for their electricity than those in the UK. This led to the accusation that British customers of French group EDF were subsidising customers in France. Much more likely an explanation – as EDF UK’s Vincent de Rivaz asserts – is that currently nuclear power, which provides most of France’s electricity, is cheaper than other forms like renewables or coal more common in the UK. But unless EDF – and the rest of the Big Six – open their books, we won’t know for sure.

This sad state of affairs is likely to continue. The British government is terrified that the energy companies won’t build the new reactors and wind farms needed to keep the lights on. Previous attempts to lean on them – such as the windfall tax – have ended in a humiliating climbdown by the government. This puts the big energy companies in a powerful position. Any move to force the Big Six to be more transparent about their prices is likely to end in a similar defeat – leaving energy consumers in the dark about their record fuel bills.

Original Source: The Guardian

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Tags:energy news UK, high energy pricing, uk energy, uk energy prices
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UK must cut emissions by 80 per cent

Tuesday, October 7th, 2008

The UK should cut greenhouse gases by at least 80 per cent by the middle of the century, according to a committee set up to advise the Government on climate change. The Government is currently committed to reducing carbon emissions by 60 per cent by 2050.

But the Committee on Climate Change, chaired by Lord Turner, said the target will have to rise to at least 80 per cent on 1990 levels in order to help the world keep rising temperatures in check.

Gordon Brown, the prime minister, has signalled he would accept a target of 80 per cent by 2050.

However Lord Turner’s report makes clear the target should include all greenhouse gases, not just carbon emissions.

The report also said that although emissions from aviation and shipping do not need to be included in the target in the short term, they must come down signficiantly in the long term if the reduction is to have a meaningful effect on climate change.

The report puts intense pressure on the Government to curb energy use and increase the use of renewables.

In a letter to the new Energy and Climate Change Secretary Ed Miliband, Lord Turner said the target could be achieved at a cost of one to two per cent of GDP in 2050 – or half of a year’s worth of growth.

He cited the following options to cut emissions:

* Improved energy efficiency by insulation, power saving and new technology in buildings and industry.

* An increase in renewables and replacing existing fossil fuel power stations with “clean technologies” like nuclear and coal connected to carbon capture storage.

* Cutting emissions from fuel by hybrid engines, biofuels and electric cars.

* Improved efficiency in heating by combined heat and power stations, ground source heat pumps and use of biomass in boilers.

* Reducing carbon produced by heavy industry such as steel and cement through new technologies.

Lord Turner said: “We have the potential to reduce our emissions by 80 per cent or more by using energy far more efficiently, by investing in developing new energy sources and by making relatively minor lifestyle changes.”

The comittee was originally going to report at the end of the year but the date was brought forward in order to have a better chance of being included in the new Bill.

Mr Brown said he wanted the target raised from 60 to 80 per cent at the Labour Party Conference last month and Mr Miliband responded positively to the report.

Mr Miliband said: “This is a pressing issue and we’ll respond to the recommendations swiftly.

“Setting an emissions target in the Climate Change Bill and establishing my new Department of Energy and Climate Change sends out a strong message, but the hard work will be for us all to make emission reductions a reality over the coming decades.”

Environmental groups also welcomed the increased target, claiming that controversial plans to build a new coal-fired power station at Kingsnorth and a third runway at Heathrow will make meeting the target more difficult. But there was concern that there was no binding target on aviation emissions, although the report made it clear there should be a reduction in the long term.

Andy Atkins, executive director of Friends of the Earth, said the Climate Change Bill, which is the first of its kind in the world, was “trail-blazing legislation.”

But he added: “We cannot afford to ignore pollution from international aviation and shipping – that would be like going on a calorie-controlled diet and ignoring the calories from chocolate bars.”

Original Source: The Telegraph

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Tags:carbon emissions, climate change, energy news UK, Global Warming, renwable energy news, uk energy
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UK energy crunch, solar panels & earth news

Posts Tagged ‘uk energy’

New property will be installed with solar panels

Why nuclear is not the UK’s energy answer

UK energy blackouts warning

UK energy bills increasing at twice the rate of EU

UK at the mercy of Russia

UK energy supply has entered into terminal decline

Why are UK energy bills still going up?

UK must cut emissions by 80 per cent

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