Wednesday
Jun272012
by 
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill UK energy policy faltering
Jun 27, 2012 Energy Politicians The Telegraph is reporting that the government body charged with reviewing major state projects has sounded the alarm bell over UK energy policy.
Up to six flagship projects have been classified as "high risk" by the spending watchdog, including new nuclear power stations and key reforms of the electricity market.
However, the watchdog is “doubtful” that Britain can have a reliable energy supply from green sources and keep energy bills affordable under the current plans.
The authority, set up by David Cameron last year, has described the Coalition’s plans to encourage more wind farms and nuclear power stations as “feasible”.
Reader Comments (131)
Wasn't a certain E. Miliband the progenitor of this debacle?
The lesson from real engineering data is that if you want to save CO2, you can't use windmills above a relatively small 'penetration'. DECC must be told this and accept it. Maybe then the organisation will understand that by making unproven assumptions it has nearly caused economic disaster. Luckily for us, Germany is nearer this state so the Greens are being forced to face reality .
Recently MacKay warned the organisation that we need to construct massively expensive and intrusive pump storage to allow any CO2 to be saved by the windmills but I suspect Davey is putting politics first, ignoring his responsibility to keep the lights on and water and sewage systems active.
Government: You can build new coal fired capacity but only with CCS.
Industry: We don't have CCS so we will not build new coal fired capacity.
www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/jun/26/plans-carbon-capture-power-station-abandoned
What energy policy?
People thought I was being daft when I lashed out 500 quid on ebay for a nice big electric start diesel generator. Nothing has happened since to make me think I made a wrong decision, especially as I could get well over a thousand for it today.
Andy S 9.12am. I,too have installed a 2KW generator (Brand new £200) in my garage with exhaust piped through the wall. I surveyed all our appliances with a wattmeter and reckon with judicious use of switching the MCBs on our consumer unit, we shall be able to keep the lights on, the central heating running and the fridge and freezer operating. The only missing bit is the washing machine/tumble drier so defer washing day!
Like you I see no reason to regret this purchase and the cost of installing proper switching.
Ed Davey's reforms were described as "not fit for purpose". DECC is also "not fit for purpose". It is run by non-technical bureaucrats with an agenda which has nothing to do with keeping the lights on and providing a reliable electricity supply at least cost to the consumer and the economy. AndyS is right to prepare his own alternative electricity supply, as neither Lab, Con or LibDem are going to do it.
"The authority, set up by David Cameron last year, has described the Coalition’s plans to encourage more wind farms and nuclear power stations as “feasible”."
Not only must these wind farms generate electricity, which they obviously do (at a price), the National Grid must also be able to supply power on demand, at any time.
Feasible must mean 'haven't yet proven it won't work'.
How about employing some engineers who know what they are doing!
From one Andy S to another.
Generators are good.
I have a kickass petrol one, and I live in NZ
Anthony Hanwell: Can you provide details of your installation. I live in a remote area, get lots of power cuts (several yesterday for example) and see no guarantee that the Government cares about people living away from the major cities. I am still contemplating one and would like your advice/lessons (perhaps in unthreaded).
A bit off topic- but bearing in mind that much of the push for "green" energy is justified by climate models.
Here's the reality
Met Office Computer Models Are Complete Rubbish
http://thegwpf.org/uk-news/6052-reminder-met-office-computer-models-are-complete-rubbish.html
Met Office 3-month Outlook, 23 March 2012: "The forecast for average UK rainfall slightly favours drier-than-average conditions for April-May-June as a whole, and also slightly favours April being the driest of the 3 months. With this forecast, the water resources situation in southern, eastern and central England is likely to deteriorate further during the April-May-June period... This forecast is based on information from observations, several numerical models and expert judgement."
Reality
April: 2012 had wettest April for 100 years, Met Office says "It has been the wettest April in the UK for over 100 years, with some areas seeing three times their usual average, figures from the Met Office show. Some 121.8mm of rain has fallen, beating the previous record of 120.3mm which was set in 2000."
June: June on course to be wettest in a century: Flooding, storms and persistent showers have blighted the country in recent weeks putting this June in line to become one of the soggiest in 100 years.
25 June: Spring is wettest in Britain for 250 years - England and Wales are on course for the wettest late spring and early summer for 250 years, experts said yesterday. June has just seen its fourth washout weekend and yet more downpours are forecast. Now it is feared combined rainfall for April, May and June will break the record of 13.2in (336mm) set in 1782 and be the highest since records began in 1766.
THIS is what we are up against.
Just read the words of the ecolunatic, Edward Davey, the "Energy" Secretary.
"Nothing threatens the beauty and the tranquillity of the countryside more than climate change,"
Full lunacy below
Green Energy Lobby Threatens To Wreck Britain's Countryside
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/journalists/rowena-mason/9354724/Energy-reforms-threaten-beauty-of-country-with-pylons-says-CPRE.html
Rowena Mason
The Coalition’s energy reforms threaten the “beauty and tranquillity” of the countryside because they encourage National Grid to cover Britain with pylons, the Campaign to Protect Rural England has warned.
Campaigners last night urged Edward Davey, the Energy Secretary, to introduce new protections for Britain's landscape amid fears the laws will cause a sprawl of infrastructure.
The Energy Bill offers companies incentives to build wind farms and nuclear power plants which will require their sub-stations, power lines and other infrastructure.
The CPRE fears that without more environmental safeguards efforts to produce more green energy will come "at the expense of the beauty, tranquillity and diversity of the countryside".
Tom Leveridge, senior energy campaigner at the CPRE, said: “The Government is very focused on increasing generation capacity to achieve its targets and we’re concerned it hasn’t paid enough attention to reducing the need for infrastructure. Less infrastructure goes hand in hand with protecting the landscape.”
Mr Davey, a senior Liberal Democrat, will today come under pressure to defend the impact of his reforms on the countryside by MPs on the energy committee.
Tim Yeo, the chairman of the committee and MP for Suffolk South, last night said he shares the concerns of the CPRE.
Both are worried the reforms will give a bigger role to National Grid, the manager of Britain’s pylons and pipes, which could create a "conflict of interest".
They claim National Grid has a vested interest in building pylons because it is “incentivised” to create more infrastructure.
"Pylons are the most offensive way of transmitting electricity because they are the most visible," Mr Yeo said. "The role played by National Grid will be very influential. It might be tempted to choose to support the kind of power that requires more power lines."
Energy and engineering companies will also have no obligation to consider how new pylons will affect the landscape or seascape under the reforms.
Mr Yeo said he would take the Energy Secretary to task on the shortcomings of the Bill.
"[The Government] needs to rethink National Grid's role and build into the bill more environmental protection," he said.
The Energy Secretary last night strongly disputed the CPRE's claims that the reforms would damage the countryside
"Nothing threatens the beauty and the tranquillity of the countryside more than climate change," he told The Daily Telegraph.
“If we don't act to clean up our power system, emissions will continue to rise and we will see the impact of this on the countryside in increasingly unpredictable weather and depletion of habitats and species diversity.
He added that the UK has "robust planning laws" to prevent local projects from going ahead if they are detrimental to the countryside.
“The future will be a lot more beautiful with low-carbon electricity than without it," he added.
My spies inform me that Ed Davey was considered to be quite competent as the President of his Junior Common Room at Oxford in the mid-80s.
It begins to look as if its been downhill all the way from there. The Energy job is way too hard for him.
Mr Hammond will soon have finished at Defence and will be looking for another challenge......
Some day soon, when the lights go off, somebody will realise that under Noo Labour we sold off what was left of a decimated great nuclear energy industry to the Japanese! Talk about Greenalists being anti-business, anti-industry, anti-British, & anti-humanity, we were once world leaders in the nuclear field, we're lucky now if we're fourth raters! All that £billions wasted over the years, squandered, all for a Greenalist utopian dream! CCS doesn't & cannot work only under the simplest of arrangements - plant more trees & crops, the first & last CCS paper I read was on line some years ago, when after a couple of pages I decided to read through some back copies of the New Civil Engineer, & yes there it was almost verbatim, with nuclear waste removed & CO2 substituted instead! Useless prats!
Latimer. Lib dems entered parliament under the expectation that they would have a nice, comfortable, well-paid and prestigious job, with lots of expenses, a superb pension scheme at the end and with no responsibility for making decisions of any magnitude. I think that says it all about their capability to run anything more taxing than the proverbial p**s up in a brewery.
Hammond, an accountant, would find it very difficult to operate in DECC unless he had a scientific sidekick with the experience and the confidence to take on the Greens in the DECC bureaucracy. Their only recourse has been to delay power projects hoping we can save CO2 by reducing power usage whilst our Power Grid heads inexorably to Third World levels of reliability and the cities and millions of people die.
I couldn't help chuckling at this. I've just got off the phone to my landlord (the National Trust, who own the whole village), We were discussing their plans to install a new sewerage system. After hundreds of years of using what are basically holes in the ground with soakaways - one for each house - they have a grand scheme to centralise all the, ahem, waste into a central processing plant. All very well, but this new plant will need constant power. I dread to think what will happen when the supply becomes intermittent. Luckily (bearing in mind the amount that this house produces) I'm the other end of the village - and I've got woods nearby!
A Rational Energy Policy.
Global Warming is now an embarrassing phrase seldom used in the media.
Sustainability is the new flavour of the month.
Lets go with the flow with these rational proposals.
The abundant gas that will be produced by fracking will last for several decades.
However when used in a powerstation to produce electrical power for the grid the energy conversion is at best around 40%.
Far better to use the gas for domestic heating where the energy conversion is in excess of 80%.
For electric power use coal.
In Britain we have several centuries worth of reserves.
There are examples of stations with good practice in removing pollutants like sulphur for an environmentally friendly waste output.
In addition to being sustainable:
Unemployment would be reduced.
Fuel bills would be cheaper.
Whats not to like?
Farmer Charlie: Watch out for the bears!
AndyS, Anthony Hanwell,
I'd be interested to get more details - perhaps others might be interested to hear your experiences. Contact me via SCEF (http://scef.org.uk/contact-us)
Like you I have been thinking about what we do when power cuts start. I did think about a generator, but if it is anything like my chain saw, it will stop working just when you need it most. A wood burning stove is an ideal backstop - because you can use it all the time - although I eventually put in a separate thermostat and central heating valve so that the rest of the house remains warm when the stove is on.
I'd be interested to hear how you get the generator to power the house. I presume you connect it in somehow. That presumably needs a massive changeover switch?
I've also wondered what happens with earthing and with RCB protection. Logically it should work the same ... but earthing sometimes doesn't work as expected.
Diesel generator - sounds good. Is it the sort of motor that runs on cooking oil if it must?
I wouldn't fancy a petrol one - petrol is a wee bit dangerous to have lying around in large quantities.
Diesel generator - sounds good. Is it the sort of motor that runs on cooking oil if it must?
I wouldn't fancy a petrol one - petrol is a wee bit dangerous to have lying around in large quantities.
Which is why the eco-numpties don't like it. No, I don't see the logic either but I have some experience over the years of the local Green activist whose default position was "no". Whatever it was you wanted to do for the town, she was against it. On one occasion even opposing a change back from something she'd opposed happening in the first place!
How do you deal with that mindset?
"For electric power use coal. In Britain we have several centuries worth of reserves."
The question is how big our economic reerves are: presumably not very different from nil?
Green Agenda;
1) Screw the West
2) Screw the West
3) Live in mud huts
4) Screw the West
5) Subsistance agriculture
6 Screw the West
7) "Depopulation"
8) Screw the West
9) Windmills
10) Screw the West.
Have I missed anything?
For generators your choice is a small petrol one to cover lighting, central heating, food preservation and a TV or a diesel to cover the whole plot.
For petrol you have to buy fuel at the pump including fuel duty which you can't reclaim, for Diesel you can buy kerosene from your local fuel merchant with zero fuel duty. If the diesel fuel pump will take it heated veggie oil, you can use the radiator water to heat the veggie oil and a small tank with diesel to start and warm up the engine on until the rad water is hot enough to thin the veggie oil.
For all generators you need a triple position switch which isolates your house from the grid when the electicity is from the Genny, don't want to electrocute any electricians do we ;) .
From the Ecclesiastical Uncle, an old retired bureaucrat in a field only remotely related to climate with minimal qualifications and only half a mind.
The Bishop’s opening piece: ‘The authority, set up by David Cameron last year, has described the Coalition’s plans to encourage more wind farms and nuclear power stations as “feasible”.’
Well, if I was reporting to the bloke who’d given me the job, I’d give him a few crumbs as well.
But I smell somebody being clever here: Feasible. Usually projects, construction, organizational reorganizations are feasible - or not. But ‘plans to encourage’? Looks and sounds good, but when the Coalition actually comes to it, they will find they have merely been told that it is possible to make 'plans to encourage' without unequivocal endorsements of either wind farms or nuclear power stations.
I hope other matters soon come along to divert the attention of the body politic elsewhere so that the ‘authority’ can climb off the fence and get on with something else, hopefully with a little more guts.
I live in a Norfolk village and over the years due to wind and snow and lightning we've had a few power cuts. I've had a generator for several years now. At first I used a little, almost silent, 1kw Honda four-stroke which is utterly reliable, easy to start and which will keep going on moderate load for about 8 hours on 3 to 4 litres of petrol. It enabled me to run the essentials by judicious load shedding. i.e. heating and cooker oil pumps plus lights or shower pump and lights, or lights and fridge. You get the picture. My system is pretty crude in that I manually isolate the house from the mains supply by knocking off the masters and then selecting the RCBs I want to power and just keeping and eye on everything. It works for us but in a house full of people I imagine it would make a good storyline for a Mr Bean episode.
I now also have an key start 5kva Hyundi diesel which is supposed to be silent but sounds anything but, in my garage. I've had various issues that have prevented me from doing a proper installation yet, but I envisage a manual system with the machine hard wired in with a change-over switch, the exhaust going through the wall to a big muffler and the whole thing up on anti-vibration mounts. I'm planning on keeping a few barrels of red diesel down the side of the garage or at a pinch it would run ok on kerosene from the heating oil tank. It has a big integral tank and will need refilling about once or twice a day.
Obviously this is a big machine and it will power anything asked of it as long one is sensible and you run the washing machine or the dishwasher and not both, for example.
I would also note that the above is totally sustainable and Green. How so? I earned the money to pay for it working on windfarm cables intended to be used offshore. So there.
"For electric power use coal. In Britain we have several centuries worth of reserves."
dearieme says
"The question is how big our economic reserves are: presumably not very different from nil?"
Well we still have some coal mines and open cast suppliers like AHT.
Its true that Polish coal is imported as being cheaper.
What about the unemployment benefit we are paying out and the costs of mental depression in our former coal mining communities?
My proposal is certainly cheaper and more sustainable all round than the present policy.
Energy policy? What energy policy? We haven't had one in the UK for decades.
I grew up in rural Perthshire, in an area without mains electricity at that time. We made do with 18th century heating and lighting, but our neighbours had small domestic generators (war surplus perhaps). On still frosty nights you could here them all (3 or 4 in earshot) chugging away; perhaps those days are about to return?
As a result of living in the dark ages I get every annoyed when people use the phrase de-carbonising the economy.
Sandy Sinclair
Philip Bratby 9.33am Reply re my generator posted on unthreaded.
Bryan, you will find that the BH brethren are against your proposal to subsidise coal because the subsidy removes money from other parts of the economy and kills jobs there. They'll probably give you an exact number too, something like "2.1 other jobs are destroyed per subsidised coal mining job".
This is the apparent effect of subsidising wind farms anyway, but for a good cause like digging up coal they might find a reason to alter their view.
Re: Jun 27, 2012 at 8:15 AM | geronimo
"Wasn't a certain E. Miliband the progenitor of this debacle?"
Certainly one of them. As Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change he was responsible for pushing through the horrendously expensive Climate Change Act 2008 through parliament. I must admit to being gobsmacked when I saw this video of him along with Frannie Armstrong (her of 10:10 video and 'Age of Stupid' notoriety). He can be seen lecturing on the dangers of increasing global temperatures based on NEGATIVE feedbacks (and yes he did say negative when even a cursory study of the science would confirm that it is heavily based on positive feedbacks!!)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1r29uVnKfaQ
Bit Bucket
Like the Germans still do, at least until 2018?
'At present Germany's federal and regional governments subsidise coal mining by up to €2.5 billion a year'
http://www.spiegel.de/international/end-of-an-industrial-era-germany-to-close-its-coal-mines-a-463172.html
I usually just pass trolls by, but Bitty, next time please block quote whoever you're replying to. It'll save me doing an in-browser search of the page to find out that the only person who's used the word "subsidy" or a derivative thereof is you (four times) in your bait-and-switch. ;-)
Ah dammit, Pharos used it while I was typing that reply. :-)
Throg, I did use the poster's name 'Bryan', but just for you, here's the quote:
Notice he says that Polish coal is cheaper. In other words mining coal here must be subsidised :-)
Another white elephant?
http://www.westernhvdclink.co.uk/
Given that the Scots will generate electricty from wind for export, when/if they decide to go independent, England and Wales will most probably buy their electricity from France. This will be cheaper as it is generated by nuclear stations.
The only argument that matters is whether any form of energy generation ought to be subsidised and the answer is no. If any "subsidy" is needed it needs to be at the point of consumption so that basic energy needs — heating, lighting, etc — are not causing hardship to the end user. The best way of doing this is to recalculate benefits to ensure that the elderly and others whose energy needs are high for medical reasons do not end up on the horns of the "eat or heat" dilemma.
Bryan is not suggesting that we subsidise coal but he is advancing an alternative view which is that subsidising it might offset some of the ongoing costs associated with the decline in the industry, a decline which is not likely to be reversed as long as the eco-nutters have the ear of government.
In any event this is not quite the same thing as subsidising the electricity producers which is what is happening with wind farms. There is no longer much disagreement, inside or outside the industry, that without the subsidies the major energy producers would not be looking at building wind-driven power stations.
But then of course you already know this but you can't resist a snide little dig, can you?
Troll.
New German and UK energy policy
Want cheap Nuclear Generated Electricity buy it from France
New German and UK energy policy
Want cheap Nuclear Generated Electricity buy it from France
Jun 27, 2012 at 2:46 PM | Jamspid
But not both at the same and we know who will be the favoured one.
You contradict yourself there. As subsidy is a subsidy, whatever it is used for.
Bryan
"we have several centuries worth of reserves"
I seem to recall that one of the arguments against closing the mines in the 80's was that they would be impossible to reopen after a period of neglect. Is this still the case, or is it now recoverable by other means?
http://www.dw.de/dw/article/0,,5157327,00.html
Now Germany is totally going non Nuclear will it be shutting this Uranium Enriching pant down
Will German companies be banned from investing in other Nuclear Facilities inside the rest of the EU and of the world
James P: there are at least two undersea coal gasification projects** each of which could power the country on syngas for decades.
Forth and Swansea Bay. Take ou the CO2 and you can use the hydrogen for CCGTs, no mining just drilling and burning. The Iron Downs field is the largest untouched coal field in the UK, 2000 feet down, 10 feet level seams. That would power the country for 60 years +.
I think until the UK's participation through its Natural Environment Research Council in managing the Beverly Forum to "provide essential scientific leadership and knowledge of the Earth system to help guide society onto a sustainable pathway during rapid global change" becomes better known, the UK, US, Oz, and Europe generally will all remain fair game for some very expensive and manipulative ideas pushed by political leaders.
It doesn't help that this informal lobby is working with IGBP in Sweden which is largely off all our radar screens. When IGBP says it "will work with relevant partners to support solutions to societal transformation", it is referring to the Beverly Forum and UNESCO and UNEP among others.
Those of us with a knowledge of history, which must not include Cameron, Obama, or Gillard, know that the statement "ever closer integration" of "bridging the gap between natural and social science communities" never ends well. We get Lysenko and reliance on WWF puff pieces as the natural sciences and the social sciences trying to figure out how to alter human nature to control individual behavior.
Green energy is ultimately about diminishing human freedom and the reliable energy that brought widespread prosperity without anyone's permission.
Green energy is nothing more than a return to a prescribed "by your leave" centrally planned economy.
No thanks. Dear Politicians and bureaucrats-Quit talking about humanity and ecosystems as if we are all your wards or serfs. Sincerely yours, Tired of Supporting Tragic Ideas From the Past
There is no need to worry about using coal for power stations and you dont need CCS to make it look attractive to any idiot who is worried about CO2 emissions.
MIT have developed a filter that removes CO2 from power staion emissions and turns it into Methane which (once the process has started) could be used to run the power station. The filter is made from nanoparticles of copper fused with gold and needs a small electrical charge.
The government knows about this because I have told them. They do not need to close any coal fired stations because this filter will be available down the line.
Ed Davey is not a good listener >.<
Well spoken esquirerobin ^.^
Don, this is so unfair:
"Slightly favours" is Met-speak for the 40%-30%-30% split in the forecast for drier-normal-wetter. BUT really, the Met office predicted 40% chance of drier, but 60% change of not drier!
How is that rubbish?
Don Keiller:
"Green Agenda;
1) Screw the West
2) Screw the West
3) Live in mud huts
4) Screw the West
5) Subsistance agriculture
6 Screw the West
7) "Depopulation"
8) Screw the West
9) Windmills
10) Screw the West.
Have I missed anything?"
I believe you might have missed the issue of them trying to screw the West. I should certainly look into that if I were you.
Oh and take money from Western governments to screw the West.