Bishop Hill Green lobbying
Oct 17, 2012 Energy: costs Greens Energy efficiency subsidy could cut UK demand 40 per cent
New Green Alliance and WWF report calls for efficiency feed-in tariff to be part of Energy Bill ahead of crucial ministerial meeting this week
Introducing a financial incentive for energy efficiency could help the UK deliver electricity demand reductions at far lower cost than building new low carbon generation capacity, green campaigners have said.
A report to be published today says an electricity efficiency feed-in tariff (EE FiT) paying projects that can demonstrate measured electricity use savings should be introduced as part of the upcoming Energy Bill.
It comes ahead of a key meeting later this week of the coalition Quad group, comprising David Cameron, George Osborne, Nick Clegg and Danny Alexander, which is expected to decide the content of the Energy Bill, including the crucial question of whether or not to adopt a decarbonisation target for the power
From Today's Moderator
Reader Comments (72)
Bitbucket:
Condensing boilers are designed to run with a specific range of temperature between the flow (the pipe taking the hot water to the radiators) and the return (the pipe bringing the cooler water back). To achieve this correct range of temperature needs a pipe/radiator system optimised for that type of boiler. Retrofitting a condensing boiler to a system designed for the older boilers means this optimal temperature range is rarely achieved and this results in the condensing boiler not achieving it's design efficiency. The "90%+" efficiency may actually be as low as 65-70% in some cases. Ideally when fitting one the whole pipework and radiator system should be checked an modified if necessary, but of course that only makes an expensive system even more costly. They make sense in a new property, but rarely in a retro-fit.
You know what is really energy efficient and green? A guillotine. It should be used liberal against the green cult criminals.
Steve (and someone else)
You asked why the WWF gets involved in running our country? The answer is the UN AGENDA 21 which is an agreement that our government signed at the original RIO summit and which it confirmed at the more recent all expenses paid holiday in Rio.
Under the agreement NGOs have the right in law to be involved not only in setting policy but also in implementing policy. AGENDA 21 is the most dangerous document I have ever read as long as you know how to read it.
Think of the EU, think of the patience of the people who founded it, think of the time they were prepared to wait before their plans for totally unelected officials to rule the new nation of the EU. AGENDA 21 works on the same principle, these guys are in it for the long term. When (if) you read the document you need to think about what it makes possible and not what it declares outright.
Bob Layson
I take my hat off to you sir and stand in awe of your creation; The Generator Finder General, priceless :)
My old freezer came to the end of its working life so I bought an all singing dancing one of the same external dimensions only to discover it held 15% less than the old one (thicker insulation) so instead of being 10% more efficient it was 5% less than the old one.
The same goes for those trucks with curved "aerodynamic" roofs that our "green" supermarkets run, they may do 1/4 MPG more (debatable) but they hold 10% less and are more difficult to load.
We are truly living in the Age of Stupid
We are forgetting history, there has been a precendent of the impending British insulation disaster:
God grief, after the nightmare debacle of the Spanish feed-i-tariffs failure - which they've now binned the whole idea - the British are still running headlong towards the feed-in-tariff cliff.
Meanwhile in Australia we have a valid and pertinent model of how government subsidy and wrong headed 'green inititatives' are a disaster from the minute they leave the lips of the enacting government.........................what are the British government doing - you guessed it - going down the same ****chute.
This sounds like a form of energy rationing, You will have to use less energy to buy it at a less expensive rate. Why is the UK taking advice from the likes of WWF and the green party on domestic energy policy? These groups are not reliable experts but activists, they are dangerous irresponsible people. There will be colder and colder winters ahead as we begin to enter a period of cooling, the reality is that these cycles of warm and cold happen and there is no avoiding them, The WWF and the rest are promoting their view that Human based emissions of CO2 are and will continue to cause temperatures to rise and will continue to rise, it's what they call a runaway greenhouse effect.
It's only when you step back from the constant bombardment of ludicrous claims, can you understand the reality that the UK is facing, when these crazy energy policies begin showing up as a rise in winter related fatalities as poverty stricken UK citizens (which there are millions now not just a minority of homeless, street people or the feckless) can no longer afford the extremely high cost of energy policies influenced by these environmental whack-jobs. Energy oppression is now on the UK's doorstep.
The Idea is to reduce peoples energy-use by hitting them where its hurt's most, they are targeting the affordability of energy which will drive millions into hardship, there is an abundance of energy on earth, but still draconian measures are being sought after and will severely punish at lot of innocent people, and what for? for simply trying to survive, to have a warm happy home during winter to be industrious and prosperous which is NOT a crime. Our citizens are now being called and described by the aristocracy and political classes as a "work force" a whole population called a "work force" this 50s soviet eastern-block style description of our domestic population is unbelievable and unacceptable, "Plebs" they call our police force, what is wrong with these people? who are they? who do they think they are?
This is probably as political as I get, I'm not a political person but the new norm now is to accept the contentious flood of one bad decision after another being made by these incompetent imbeciles with sociology, anthropology and political degrees that become elected to govern.
Sparks: "There will be colder and colder winters ahead as we begin to enter a period of cooling..."
If a climate scientist said there would be warmer and warmer winters ahead, you and your friends here would demand all sorts of evidence and "debunk" any that was given. But claim that it will be colder and colder and... not a hint of disagreement. Any lurkers who think there is any scientific rigour here might want to ponder on that.
@ botbucket Oct 18, 2012 at 8:51 PM
Colder and cooler, anybody can say that, I personally think it is true, the pointers all show cooler - the Sun the main driver of climate Temperature: is in hibernation. Volcanoes are pumping aerosols into the upper atmosphere, the oceans are in cold phase the Antarctic sea ice is at record levels.
Anecdotally, winters have been cold in the last 6 years in Britain and Northern Europe and the trend towards colder is not a figment any longer...... Britain has been cool and wet, it will now become cooler and wetter and in December very much colder - that's the trend.
It was the Alarmist warmistas, who claimed the end of the world was nigh - we said we do not believe you - prove it - and as it turned out: all they had was a few pathetic models and some 19th century supposition.
There's no proof - because the whole CAGW is a fiction - the burden of proof is incumbent on the shills, quasi climatologists, politicians and snake oil salesmen who claim it to be true [catastrophic warming is real] - we are still waiting but most of the pragmatists realised long ago - you cannot prove a non-existent phenomena.
Why not use the rest of the phrase in your quote BitBucket?
"There will be colder and colder winters ahead as we begin to enter a period of cooling, the reality is that these cycles of warm and cold happen and there is no avoiding them..."
Nothing particularly contentious there I'd have thought, particularly given the current brou-ha-ha over the rather well documented 15 year 'pause' in temperature rise.
Sparks's main point is the issue addressed in the rest of the thread, that current policy is leading to a reduction in supply capability and an increase in costs which particularly affects the vulnerable. That policy is also leading to rationing of power. Do you approve of that? How would you address energy policy to protect the vulnerable? Or are you just here to nitpick?
(And you can thank me for the explanation of boiler efficiency if you wish).
Cumbrian Lad, yes, rude of me. Thanks for the explanation. Actually I was rather confused on the issue and still trying to find out more. At the risk of turning this into a plumbing thread: I gathered that boiler efficiency falls when the return water temperature is above the dew point (57C). I don't know what internal controls boilers have, but a control on either the flow rate or flow temperature would allow the installer to adjust the system to achieve a suitable return temperature, whatever the nature of the installed pipework (assuming the boiler is suitably sized). Hence I don't see why there should be a problem. But then, as all I know about plumbing can be written on a postage stamp, this is probably rubbish.
On cool periods, I can accept that they might come and go for various reasons, but to claim baldly that we are entering one now has as much going for it as me claiming that the earth is just about to turn into a sticky chocolate cake.
On, "...That policy is also leading to rationing of power. Do you approve of that? How would you address energy policy to protect the vulnerable?...", the use of the word rationing is emotive and not helpful. It is like saying that wine and spirits (or cigarettes, narcotics) are being rationed because because high taxation makes them unaffordable to many. You'd say that power is different because it is essential (some, although not I, would disagree).
It is surely the job of welfare policy to protect the vulnerable, not energy policy. In a way what you are implying, although you may not realise it, is that power prices should always be maintained low as a matter of policy, in order to protect the vulnerable. That is done in many countries through blanket fuel subsidies, and the result is a subsidy to everyone but the poor - who use little energy whatever the price. If you want the state to improve the lot of the energy-poor (although relatives, not the state, would be first in line in my book), then improving housing is the obvious place to start.
Rationing is exactly the right word. Wine and spirits markets can be controlled by price, but I'm not aware of any impending shortage of those items. Power on the other hand is going to be in short supply within a few years, as documented by DECC, and the plans already in the public domain show quite clearly that 'demand management' (rationing) will come into play. That's what the whole thread has been about.
The effect of that can be reduced by improving insulation, but as discussed above that only goes a part of the way to filling the hole. The rest is price manipulation to make peak use expensive, and the use of smart meters to reduce usage as needed. Rationing is exactly the right word. Not emotive, just accurate.
Your reference to welfare policy is a red herring. Welfare should be a safety net, not an end in itself. Energy policy should be aimed at providing sufficient energy at an economic price for the economy to be able to function, to be competitive, and to grow. That then produces wealth which can take care, directly or indirectly, of the population in all its varieties. If, as has been done over the last two decades, you engineer a situation where power is rationed, expensive and uncertain then you hobble business, increase it's costs, reduce growth and wealth generation. That leads to more people falling into the welfare net and creates a need for more taxes which again acts as a brake on growth, etc., etc.
The last few winters in this country would be described quite definitely as cooler than previous. I saw far more snow in the last three years than in the previous ten. That adequately enough describes a 'cool period' to me. I also saw very little sticky chocolate cake. Your mileage may vary.
Yes, some pipework can be modified (as implied in my posts) but not all can be at economic cost. It would be a far better use of money to change the control systems in older properties (for instance adding 3way valves, cylinder stats and better programmers). A few hundred quids worth of control equipment would show far better results than multi-thousands on expensive boilers, particularly given the reputation of the condensing boilers for high maintenance costs and short lifetimes.
My dictionary says: Rationing: a fixed amount of a commodity officially allowed to each person during a time of shortage, as in wartime: 1947 saw the bread ration reduced.
What you are talking about is the effects of the supply/demand curve, not rationing. It is fair to argue that reduced supply is undesirable, but making up your own meanings for words to strengthen an argument has the reverse effect (except on those already convinced).
I notice that your concern has now switched from protecting the vulnerable to more general concerns about the economy. That, to me, is a more reasonable concern for reasons I went into above. But the thread was about reducing demand through energy efficiency and I have seen nothing that makes me think 40% is not possible.
What part of the situation does not fit that definition? A fixed amount of energy made available to each person during a period of shortage of energy. That's what we have in a couple of years. That's rationing, Your example of the wine/spirits is the supply demand curve.
My concerns about the energy policy are not general, they are specifically that they disadvantage the vulnerable.
It's been shown clearly enough above that whilst 40% reduction in use is technically possible, it is ruinously expensive and will imact the economy very negatively, hurting the vulnerable the most.
Your last post is frankly bizarre.
Sorry, but if you're going to reverse the meaning of words, you're not worth discussing with,
Oct 19, 2012 at 1:34 AM | BitBucket
Your comment above reveals a breathtaking lack of knowledge. I would stick to commenting on non-technical things if I were you.
Billy Liar, breathtaking? Are the comparative effects of piping and radiator layout, dew points in gas-fired condensing boilers, flow and return temperatures, an area of technology that all well educated laymen are typically expected to have? Let's have a poll: hands-up all readers who have no more of a clue than me. How is my statement wrong? Cumbrian Lad, who seems to be a plumber, didn't notice any error.
Cumbrian Lad:
No that is fiction.
Ruinously expensive - where does that come from? Say, we spent £20000 each on 20 million houses to improve their energy efficiency. That would buy some pretty efficient houses for £40bn and employ a large number of people. That cost, £40bn, is about the same as the defence budget for a year or the foreign aid budget for 6 years, or a fraction of the bank bailouts, or etc... Is it really ruinous? Hardly! Would it be such a poor investment?
Which words did I reverse? There must be a name in the blogosphere for such reverse accusations. I suggest you are redefining the word 'rationing', and in reply you accuse me of the same sin without qualifying the accusation. I've seen this before on BH, which makes me think it is a "skeptic" ploy (or maybe not just "skeptics", who knows) when losing an argument. Or maybe it is a remnant of playground, "Yes you did", "No I didn't", style argument. Either that or it indicates a lack of understanding...
And then slouching off with your tail between your legs, "I'm not playing with you any more...". Playground stuff I think.
Oops, that would be £400bn - coming closer to ruinous! Let's make it £4000 on 10 million houses... Could that cut usage by 40%? I have no idea. Mackay's example shows that significant amounts can be saved very easily with no cost (turning off vampires). But my guess is that only higher prices would give people the right incentive.
Smartmetering, and it's use in rationing (demand management to use the euphemism) is going to be a reality. DECC's own documents say so. If you prefer the ostrich ploy, fair enough, but don't forget to stock up on blankets.
Smart metering and demand management are not the same as rationing. Again, the dictionary is your friend.
Bit Bucket
I agree with Cumbrian Lad. Very few households will either program or use their smart meters to change their habits. I mean,can you really expect Joe Bloggs to stop cooking dinner or turn off the TV because the power price has gone up? And do you think a goverment will last very long once the first powerbills go out with the spot priced time of use consumption figures on?
What they are envisaged to be used for is two-fold. They will allow power companies to read the meters without sending someone round to read it, and to allow companies to turn off appliances remotely if demand exceeds supply. By any reasonable definition, the second of these can be called rationing.
In the old days, at least in New Zealand, they had smart meters. This was ripple control, where a high frequency signal was injected into the AC supply to turn relays on and off, that allowed the companies to turn the electrically heated hot water cylinders or space heating off during periods of high demand. By law, it was supposed to be less than 5 hours a day and most days was less than 15 minutes. The power to the water cylinder went through a separate meter and was supplied at a cheaper tariff. Very efficient, but the market driven gurus got rid of it as too inefficient. Now it is coming back, albeit in a more expensive guise.
Chris, what you describe in NZ sounds similar to the frequency response employed by the UK national grid to manage demand from large industrial users, although in the NZ case there is a signal imposed upon the mains, rather than using the mains frequency itself. In the UK, this is a service provided to the grid operator by their customers, who presumably receive compensation.
Your text on the effects at a household level is confusing. First you criticise smart meters because Joe Bloggs can't be expected to decide to stop cooking dinner when the instantaneous price goes up. Then you say that the purpose of the meters (in addition to remote-reading) is to allow the power company to turn off Joe's cooker. Which is it, voluntary or not? If you think it is not voluntary, how do you imagine the power company is going to know what is drawing power in any house and which appliance to turn off? Do you imagine the smart meter replacing the distribution board (or whatever it is called - the thing with the breakers/fuses in it)? Where do you get such ideas?
By the way, the power company can already turn off the power to a block of consumers in emergencies or when there is a fault. We call it a power-cut, not rationing. Where is the difference?
"Sounds similar to the frequency response employed by the UK national grid to manage demand from large industrial users, although in the NZ case there is a signal imposed upon the mains, rather than using the mains frequency itself. In the UK, this is a service provided to the grid operator by their customers, who presumably receive compensation."
BB - Please explain what are you on about here or perhaps give a reference. What do you mean by "frequency response... to manage demand..."? What service is provided by customers to the grid operator? What would customers receive compensation for?
Martin, you surprise me! Google "fcdm national grid"