Tuesday
Aug212012
by 
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill Yup, desperate
Aug 21, 2012 Climate: WG3 Energy: wind A few days ago, I noted some rampant misrepresentation of Gordon Hughes GWPF report by the Chief Executive of RenewableUK, the self-help group for subsidy junkies. It now appears that responsibility for this onerous task has been passed down to the deputy CEO, Maf Smith. In an article in the Express, Mr Smith is quoted as follows:
We want to keep electricity bills as low as possible. So we have to stop importing massive amounts of expensive fossil fuels from abroad as we have no control over how much they cost. We know exactly how much wind costs: just 2p per household per day – that’s according to independent regulator Ofgem.
I'm speechless.
Reader Comments (70)
"2p per household per day", where do I sign up?
£350/year extra on average to pay for wind is 50 times higher than 2p/day......
[Snip - manners]
Fraud by False Representation? (Fraud Act 2006)
http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2006/35/section/2
Fraud by false representation
(1)A person is in breach of this section if he—
(a)dishonestly makes a false representation, and
(b)intends, by making the representation—
(i)to make a gain for himself or another, or
(ii)to cause loss to another or to expose another to a risk of loss.
(2)A representation is false if—
(a)it is untrue or misleading, and
(b)the person making it knows that it is, or might be, untrue or misleading.
(3)“Representation” means any representation as to fact or law, including a representation as to the state of mind of—
(a)the person making the representation, or
(b)any other person.
(4)A representation may be express or implied.
(5)For the purposes of this section a representation may be regarded as made if it (or anything implying it) is submitted in any form to any system or device designed to receive, convey or respond to communications (with or without human intervention).
These people should be challenged.
@ Don Keiller
I agree that they should be charged with fraud because they knowingly make misleading statements to make money. I've written to my MP complaining about a wind developer and I've quoted that extract from the Fraud Act 2006.
BT years ago said its internet provision was better because it was DSL, rather than the much faster ADSL where upload speeds were much lower than download ones.
Currently on secondment to Ruinables UK
"Maf Smith is the Scottish Director of the Sustainable Development Commission. He leads a staff team supporting the SDC’s work as the independent advisor to the Scottish Government on sustainable development, reporting directly to the First Minister."
So that is where 'Wee Eck' gets his costings from
BTW...where is the Ofgem reference for '2p a day'?
Does anyone know what Ofgem have actually said?
What assumptions are included in the 2p/day?
It would be nice to see how it was calculated and compare it with the other estimates.
2p per household per day, 20 million households, 12000 employees . . .
That's £12,166 per employee per annum, provided the windmills have no maintenance, connection, or other operational costs. The minimum wage is £11,700 for a 37 hour week.
Aren't engineers cheap these days . . .?
The Australian Greens are at it as well:
So you snipped my comment about Smiffy. Well he should start listening to himself and would come to the same conclusion as I did. We all realize that the drive for wind is escalating costs which are loaded onto our bills. This produces a poorer product produced at variable times but never when most required. Totally moronic. Let's go back in time to those heady days of FF/nuclear as the dual reliable mix.
Here is the link, if anyone has the fortitude to visit:
http://greens.org.au/content/csiro-busting-renewable-energy-myths
"There are many myths peddled about wind energy, often by those with a vested interest in spreading untruths"
said the spokesman for the wind industry.
Meanwhile, back here in the real world...
I think he meant 2p per person per day per wind turbine. We just need to multiple the number of turbines in operation.
I suspect the calculations lie somewhere in here - will try to have a plough through it this afternoon.
http://www.ofgem.gov.uk/Sustainability/Environment/RenewablObl/Documents1/Renewables%20Obligation%20Annual%20Report%202010-11.pdf
Is it just me who finds the phrase "We know exactly how much wind costs: just 2p per household per day" slightly worrying - as far as I'm aware, wind costs roughly the square root of bugger all, it's all those wind turbines and the necessary transmission system which costs the money.
"2p per day"
Can't be generating much, then.
Some snippets from the above report:
"The total value of the ROCs presented for compliance was £1.3 billion, based on the value of a ROC of £51.34. Based on this value of a ROC, the cost of CO2 saved under the scheme in 2010-11 was £106.62 per tonne."
Looking at ROC's rather than any other costs, that's £1.3 billion, which, if we assume 24 million households gives us £54.17 per household p.a. or around 15p a day.
Further into the report they state that out of the 24.9 million ROCs issued, 7.7M were for onshore wind, so applying that factor to our figures would still leave us somewhere north of 4.5p per day per household just for ROCs and only for Onshore wind.
Colour me sceptical, but I call bullshit on the 2p figure, unless someone wants to point out where I've gone wrong in the above maths and can also explain how, other than ROCs, wind power costs absolutely nothing.
If you assume 20 million households in the UK, that’s £146 million per year. Could that correspond to the subsidy received by windfarmers?
You could do a similar sum to prove that the Royal family only costs pennies. But then no-one is proposing to make 40% of the population Royals by 2030 ...
But from The Telegraph
Zed and follow-ups removed.
The Ofgem figures (for which I can't find a source, but may be in the report linked by SteveW above) are mentioned by Richard Black here http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-17783604). However they only refer to the cost of Renewables Obligation Certificates (ROC) - they are not the whole cost of renewables.
Here is DECC's estimate of the costs 'with energy and climate change policies' and 'without energy and climate change policies' which paints a much less rosy picture.
http://www.decc.gov.uk/assets/decc/11/about-us/economics-social-research/3593-estimated-impacts-of-our-policies-on-energy-prices.pdf
Annex D (p62) says that the cost of ROC is £17/year/household (similar to Ofgem's £15.50 as reported by Richard Black in April who says about half is attributable to wind - hence about £8 or 2p/day).
But according to DECC, energy and climate change policies amounted to £89/year/household in 2011, or 7% of total gas + electricity bills (10 % of electricity bills). ROC is £17 of that £89 and the rest is the EU Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS), the Carbon Emissions Reduction Target (CERT), Feed in Tariffs, etc.
And this assumes (I think) that the wholesale price of electricity is the same with and without the policies, which seems to me unlikely, given that the mix of generation sources must be influenced by the policies.
Table E2 (p64) is even scarier, suggesting that the policies have already added 15% to the retail price of electricity (£/kWh), and this will rise to 27% by 2020.
The way DECC brings its headline figures down (Table 1, p9) which manages to suggest that its policies will reduce costs overall, is by assuming that consumption of energy will fall through greater take-up of insulation, efficient appliances etc (paras iv-vi p10).
James Delingpole returns from house moving, with something to say about the wind industry. http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100177372/david-camerons-greatest-crime/
Thanks SteveW
http://www.ofgem.gov.uk/Sustainability/Environment/RenewablObl/Documents1/Renewables%20Obligation%20Annual%20Report%202010-11.pdf
I could not find anything that tied up with the 2p/household/day
Although I did find a footnote that said
"The value of the RO scheme is calculated at £1.487 billion by multiplying the estimated supply of electricity in the UK in 2011/12 (310 TWh
– DECC prediction) by the obligation level (12.4 ROCs per 100 MWh) and then multiplying by the 2011/12 ROC buy-out price (£38.69)."
I wonder if that should be 20p/household/day just to cover the ROCs - assuming 20 million households
“consumption of energy will fall through greater take-up of insulation, efficient appliances etc”
Hard to see how heating appliances can be made more efficient when they’re already transferring all of their input into the air/water/baked beans or whatever. Perhaps DECC have been watching too much TV and now believe that 110% effort is possible...
Et, surely they subtract the cost of ROCs in their calcs, not add it? ROCs are a payment to wind-power generators from non-'eco' generators.
Obviously a wrong way to calculate things.
"solar PV can provide 40% of our power without causing problems for steady supply"
Don't they have night-times down under?
"Turbines don’t need much wind to start turning that’s why they generate electricity for at least 80 per cent of the time."
Is this true?
Jack - it doesn't matter if it is true or not. Unless miracles start happening, turbines won't be able to generate more power than provided by the wind that makes them turn.
No much wind ===> no much power
My 2 pence -- alas in the form of two questions regarding feedbacks (not further elaborated here): Desperate addiction [i]? Even reinforced [ii]?
Do you know research that explores that -- at least sometimes -- some kind of institutionalized and / or organized feedbacks...
[i] ...increase dependences of the individuals involved [perhaps as addictive as cigarettes]?
[ii] ...amplyfy even extremist tendencies in the search of the best (utopian!?) and / or worst (dystopian!?) news?
It's interesting that commentators are saying the cost of wind is next to nothing and that capacity can be provided by windmills in Europe. Funny how these same commentators seem to forget that the same amount, if not more, of standby capacity that is still needed and is always running is somehow never costed in to their equations.
I wonder why that is?
Seems to me that if you spend £100bil on windmills and then another £30 odd billion on back up power stations then why not just cut out the windmills and save yourself £100bil?
Secondly, why not extract all that gas through fracking to power the power stations? Would it not still be cheaper developing fracking and new power stations instead of, pardon my French, p1ssing money away in to the wind (pun on purpose!)?
Mailman
I know that the troll comment will be deleted, but these non-technical people, no matter how often it is explained to them, do not understand the difference between an OCGT and a CCGT.
Or that gas turbines do not run on gas! It must be confusing for them...
@ Jack Maloney - the following is a link to one of several papers recently mentioned regarding wind power in the Netherlands: http://www.clepair.net/windSchiphol.html
Look at figure 2 and you will see the typical output versus wind speed of a turbine. Note that the cut in point is around 8mph, however even by 15mph it will only be producing 20% of the name plate output. This is basic laws of physics and will (give or take a little) apply to any machine regardless of size. What it DOES mean is that, just because one is turning, it doesn't mean the actual output is necessarily going to be significant. As I type this the BM Reports site shows the UK's wind farms are currently providing just 18.5% of their theoretical maximum output, or 2.2% of UK demand: http://www.bmreports.com/bsp/bsp_home.htm
Seems to me that everyone in the renewables' propaganda industry is really called Lion Wayne Kerr.
George Orwell would be impressed, and use this as a fine example of the power of state propaganda.
Dave Ward
Thank you for the link, really put things in perspective.
From BWEA's website (which is currently down so I really got this from google cache)...
http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&ved=0CD0QFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.bwea.com%2Fmedia%2Fnews%2Farticles%2Fpr20120315-2.html&ei=FLQzUJu2K6e78AGf_4Bw&usg=AFQjCNEJmkTQP0Cz01nBIm60ovyVwH39TA
Explanation of costs:
Renewables Obligation 2010/2011 = 34,749,418 ROCs (Ofgem Renewables Obligation Annual Report 2010-11)
ROC price = £36.99
Value of total obligation = (34.7million ROCs * £36.99) = £1,285,380,972
Domestic supply accounts for 31% of UK electricity (DECC Digest of UK Energy Statistics Table 5.1)
Value of Domestic portion of Renewables Obligation = (£1.2billion * 31%) = £398.5million
Number of households in the UK = 26.3million (Office for National Statistics, Families & Households, 2011)
Cost of RO per household energy bill = £398.5million / 26.3million = £15.15
Offshore & onshore wind accounted for 51.1% of ROCs in 2010/11 (20.2% and 30.9% respectively) giving a cost per household for wind of (£15.15 * 51.1%) = £7.74.
Well that link was a mess. Try this one...
http://www.bwea.com/media/news/articles/pr20120315-2.html
Thanks DGH
so the 2p/household/day appears to refer to the cost of the ROCs only for 2010/2011
Edwin: "I think he meant 2p per person per day per wind turbine."
Edwin nails it.
DGH -
Sounds like you've nailed the source of the "2p/day/household" figure.
But why should one consider only domestic electricity bills? Surely all citizens indirectly bear the burden of the subsidy for industrial electricity bills as well. It would seem more logical to divide the total value of the wind ROCs by the number of households. Which would triple the answer, yielding £25/year/household.
.
Of course, that's just for wind, which accounted for 12.7 MROCs, or about 12.7 TWh. Citizens also have to support the other ~50% of ROCs. And feed-in-tariffs... And it's only going to increase as the energy generation increases over time.
I presume that 2p includes the cost of the standby/back up generators that need to be kept turning over 24/7 for when the wind doesn't blow!
I think he meant per household brick per day.
Did he include amortized capex over the life of the turbines, or was it just opex? And what about expressing the price as p per kWh, rather than p per day.
All explained:
http://uk.linkedin.com/pub/maf-smith/25/131/768
ZT: Yes that explains it all. No technical knowledge at all, but well fed at the public trough.
Zed and follow-ups removed.
----
You must have this in a script by now :)
Anyone today that thinks that wind power is cheaper than "real" electricity is dimmer than a 5 watt bulb