Hinkley
EDF’s works council said on Monday it had voted to order an external study into the French utility’s project to build two nuclear reactors at Hinkley Point in Britain. The works council said it was missing key information and ordered the study to help it to prepare a recommendation about the 18 billion pound (23 billion euros) project. EDF’s main unions want the company to delay the Hinkley Point project by three years, the time they say is needed to finish other nuclear projects in France and China. The works council did not say when the study would be ready or when it expected to make its recommendation, which will not be binding on EDF. EDF chief executive Jean-Bernard Levy said late last month that Hinkley Point would be launched once the works council had issued its recommendation. Economy Minister Emmanuel Macron has said he expected a final investment decision in September. EDF declined to comment.
Daily Mail 9th May 2016 read more »
Hinkley Point C the new nuclear power station to be constructed in the south-west of the UK, just 170 miles off the coast of Ireland, will be the “most expensive object on earth” according to Greenpeace.
Belfast Telegraph 10th May 2016 read more »
Moorside
The public’s chance to have a say on a proposed new £10 billion nuclear power station begins on Saturday. NuGen, the firm behind plans for the three-reactor Moorside plant, is hosting 28 public drop-in sessions over the next 11 weeks to gauge public opinion to the scheme. They begin at the Moorside Information Centre at Whitehaven Civic Hall, which opens at 10am on Saturday and remains open (10am to 4pm Monday to Friday and 10am to noon on Saturdays) for the duration of the consultation. Fergus McMorrow, NuGen’s planning lead in Cumbria, said: “It is extremely important that everyone gets an opportunity to come and have their say. “This consultation is the second of two public consultations. The first took place over 10 weeks from May 2015 and we welcomed over 1,800 people through the doors of our events. “The second stage is an opportunity for the public to see how the project has developed, taking into account the feedback that we received last year.”
Whitehaven News 10th May 2016 read more »
MILLOM could benefit from a property market boom triggered by the new nuclear development at Moorside, Sellafield. Cumbria Local Enterprise Partnership has predicted population growth of 50,000 in the county over the next 10 years, much of it due to an influx of labour needed for the site in west Cumbria. All these workers will need somewhere to live temporarily or permanently. A major effect on housing sales and lettings is inevitable.
North West Evening Mail 10th May 2016 read more »
Wylfa & Trawsfynydd
Final site clearance of Wylfa and Trawsfynydd will not be achieved for “many decades” according to the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA). The NDA has submitted evidence to the Welsh Affairs committee’s as part of its ongoing investigation into the future of nuclear power in Wales. Wylfa is now in the “defueling” phase which should be completed around 2019. This involves removing fuel from the reactor and taking it to Sellafield for reprocessing. The NDA states in its evidence that when this is finished “more than 99% of the radioactive hazard will have been removed from the site”.
Wales Online 9th May 2016 read more »
EDF
French energy giant EDF says sales fell 7% in the first three months of the year in the face of stiff competition, a mild winter and lower energy prices. The figures come ahead of Wednesday’s AGM where investors will quiz management over their plans for the Hinkley Point nuclear plant in the UK.
BBC 10th May 2016 read more »
EDF on Tuesday reported a 6.7 percent fall in first-quarter sales due to increasing competition, record low wholesale power prices and mild winter weather. In France, where the corporate and municipal power market was opened to competition at the start of the year, the energy company’s revenue fell more than 600 million euros to 12.1 billion euros (10 billion pounds), with 278 million due to higher competition, the rest to lower prices and warm weather. Revenue in Britain fell 13.2 percent to 2.93 billion euros as the company lost market share.
Reuters 10th May 2016 read more »
Record low wholesale power prices and increasing domestic competition led French utility EDF to report a drop in sales in the first quarter. The state-controlled group, which is debating whether to build a controversial £18bn nuclear project in the UK, said that sales were down 7 per cent to €21.4bn in the first three months of the year. In France, the company said that sales were down 4.8 per cent in organic terms “due to the impacts of increased competition in a historically low price environment and mild weather.” In the UK, there was an organic decrease in sales of 9.8 per cent as the group suffered from a lower number of residential customer accounts on power and gas sales.
FT 10th May 2016 read more »
NDA
The UK government’s Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA), which exists to ensures the safe and efficient clean-up of the UK’s nuclear legacy, announced on Monday that it has awarded three new framework contracts valued at up to GBP12m to ten consortia, following a five-month procurement process. Last awarded in 2012, the new contracts will cover the next four years and will involve more than 70 organisations, including UK universities, global corporations and three consortia led by about 20 Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs). Innovative solutions to technical challenges are being sought by the NDA and its Direct Research Portfolio (DRP) forms a key part of the authority’s strategic research programme. This programme is focused on direct funding for research that delivers innovation across multiple sites, develops technical expertise and informs NDA’s strategy.
Financial News 10th May 2016 read more »
DECC
The head of Britain’s consumer watchdog has been recruited to become Whitehall’s leading energy mandarin. will leave the Competition and Markets Authority, which he has run since its inception in October 2013, to become permanent secretary at the Department of Energy and Climate Change. It comes as the CMA is in the closing stages of a three-year investigation into the domestic energy market, which has been criticised for being too soft on the big suppliers. The CMA also weighed in on Three’s proposed takeover of O2 last month, claiming that the deal could harm British consumers. Although the CMA is highly familiar with the energy market, Mr Chisholm, an Irishman, did not sit on the panel leading the investigation. His appointment was welcomed by one independent supplier: “Having somebody with competition and commercial experience in essence running DECC is not a bad thing. On occasion, they did need someone with a commercial understanding how the Big Six in particular run their business.”
Times 11th May 2016 read more »
Nuclear Skills
The UK government has announced details of almost £80 million ($115 million) in funding to support the creation of five new National Colleges that it says will support the delivery of major infrastructure projects, including new nuclear. The centres of high-tech training will “ensure the UK has skilled people in industries crucial to economic growth – high speed rail, nuclear, onshore oil and gas, digital skills and the creative industries”, the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) said yesterday.
World Nuclear News 10th May 2016 read more »
Electricity Markets
The Future Power System Architecture Project will “challenge the established architecture” of the power system and identify 35 new or extended functions for the UK power grid when it submits its full report in July, industry leaders heard at an event in London last night.
Utility Week 10th May 2016 read more »
Nuclear War
Barack Obama’s historic visit to Hiroshima should not be interpreted as an apology, his spokesman said on Tuesday in the wake of the announcement that Obama would become the first sitting president to visit the site where the US dropped an atomic bomb in 1945, killing an estimated 140,000 people in the final days of the second world war.
Guardian 10th May 2016 read more »
US will launch nuclear strike on North Korea, Donald Trump claims.
Daily Star 11th May 2016 read more »
Express 11th May 2016 read more »
China
Doubts that nuclear is worth the huge costs, and safety fears, could wipe out orders for Chinese reactors, writes Steve Thomas. China’s nuclear power industry has eyed up a big push to export its technologies as countries around the world consider low-carbon alternatives to coal. But despite an increasingly clearer field for Chinese nuclear exports – mainly because of the woes dragging down French and Russian competitors – selling reactors abroad is likely to prove to a much tougher task than had first been thought. Perhaps the biggest uncertainty is whether there will be much of a nuclear export market at all. Since 2008, reactors built in China have accounted for the majority of the world’s new reactor construction starts, and in 2015, there were only seven new construction starts, six of which were for China. While there are a large number of countries talking about buying reactors, many of which would be their first nuclear projects, the history of these types of exports suggests only a small number of these will be translated into real orders. Moreover, many countries have major concerns about relying on China for the supply of such a strategically important piece of infrastructure. In particular, their concerns centre on the quality of components, the rigour of the Chinese regulatory system, the risk of dependence on China and the potential leakage of technologies that have hugely strategic geopolitical use.
China Dialogue 10th May 2016 read more »
Iran
Was the Iran nuclear deal just a triumph of White House spin?
Guardian 10th May 2016 read more »
Germany
Germany’s largest utility E.ON is ready to accept a deal proposed by the government that makes nuclear power plant operators pay for a significant portion of the phase-out of nuclear energy in the country, Handelsblatt has learned, making it the first major utility to signal its willingness to cooperate. The move comes two weeks after a government-backed commission proposed that utilities pay a total of €23 billion, or $26 billion, into a publicly-managed fund, which will cover the cost of the long-term storage of nuclear waste. The plan solicited resistance from Germany’s four largest utilities E.ON, RWE, EnBW and Vattenfall, which have so far only set aside €17 billion to cover the cost of the phase out.
Handelsblatt 10th May 2016 read more »
Hydrogen
The Orkney Islands have been chosen for the development of a new European-wide hydrogen project which builds on the existing Orkney Surf ‘n’ Turf initiative. This wider European project is called BIG HIT (Building Innovative Green Hydrogen systems in an Isolated Territory: a pilot for Europe). BIG HIT is a five-year project, involving 12 participants based across six EU countries, and starts later this month. The local authority partner in BIG HIT is Orkney Islands Council, providing local input together with the Shapinsay Development Trust (SDT), Community Energy Scotland (CES), and the European Marine Energy Centre (EMEC).
Scottish Energy News 11th May 2016 read more »
Renewables
Fergus Ewing, Scottish Energy Minister, has called on the Tory UK government to ‘change course’ over its renewable policies have result in the UK crashing out of the World Top 10 list of most investor-attractive nations for investment in renewables. The EY Renewable Energy Country Attractiveness Index showed that the UK has slumped four places in the rankings – from 8th in June 2015 index to 13th in the latest report. In contrast, the Scottish Government is showing global leadership on the issue – with the confirmation in March that we have powered through our target of generating half of Scottish electricity consumption from renewables. “But if we are to meet our ambitious renewables and climate change targets we must go further – that’s why we will bring forward a new long term Scottish energy strategy to make electricity cleaner, affordable and more secure for consumers.
Scottish Energy News 11th May 2016 read more »
Almost everything you know about climate change solutions is outdated, for several reasons. First, climate science and climate politics have been moving unexpectedly quickly toward a broad consensus that we need to keep total human-caused global warming as far as possible below 2°C (3.6°F) — and ideally to no more than 1.5°C. This has truly revolutionary implications for climate solutions policy. Second, key climate solutions — renewables, efficiency, electric cars, and storage — have been advancing considerably faster than anyone expected, much faster than the academic literature anticipated. The synergistic effect of all these light-speed changes is only now beginning to become clear (see, for instance, my recent post, “Why the Renewables Revolution Is Now Unstoppable”. Third, the media and commentariat have simply not kept up with all these changes and their utterly game-changing implications. As a result we end up with recent articles in such prestige publications as Foreign Affairs and the New York Times that are literally out-of-date the instant they are published, as I’ll discuss below.
Climate Progress 10th May 2016 read more »
Renewables – wind
A new wind farm in the Scottish Highlands is set to power the creation of some of the nation’s best-known chocolate bars and pet foods. Now the equivalent of all the energy needed to produce the likes of Snickers, Mars Bars, Dolmio and Pedigree Chum in the UK will be supplied by a 20-turbine scheme at Moy, near Inverness. The move comes after Mars signed a ten-year deal with the wind farm operator that will see its entire UK manufacturing operation run on 100 per cent renewable power.
Scotsman 11th May 2016 read more »
Renewables – tidal
Former Tory Energy Minister Charles Hendry has been appointed by the Dept for Energy (DECC) to head an Independent Review of Tidal Lagoons. The review will assess the strategic case for tidal lagoons and whether they could play a cost effective role as part of the UK energy mix. The review will also help establish an evidence base to ensure all decisions made regarding tidal lagoon energy are in the best interest of the UK. Its findings are expected to be announced in the Autumn.
Scottish Energy News 11th May 2016 read more »
Energy Monitoring
Community Energy Scotland has launched a new energy monitoring service, available to community groups, social landlords and other interested parties. Community Energy Scotland was previously involved in two energy monitoring projects, one carried out in partnership with Hebridean Housing Partnership, and the other in partnership with Albyn Housing Association, both of which were funded through the Scottish Federation of Housing Association’s Energy Ideas Fund.
Scottish Energy News 11th May 2016 read more »
Energy Storage
The future of the forecourt petrol station is, well, it hasn’t got one. And want to know what will be powering your home in the future? It’ll be your car. This is the vision of Nissan, the Japanese carmaker, which is the world’s largest electric vehicle manufacturer. The company has joined with two energy giants to map out a future in which not only is the battery-powered car mainstream, it will earn money as a part-time power source. In a radical rethinking, Nissan’s new joint venture partners, Enel, the Italian energy group, and National Grid, of Britain, regard the car as a mobile energy storage facility — a battery on wheels. The idea is that if you are not using your electric car to get somewhere in an environmentally friendly way, it can be used as the ultimate localised power station. Rather than lying idle, the family electric car and its battery can fill up with cheap energy during the night-time, off-peak usage period through the home or streetside charging point. It can then be used to power the home when households are usually consuming peak-price electricity.
Times 11th May 2016 read more »
Fossil Fuels
NICOLA Sturgeon has “taken flight from reason” after cynically hardening her stance against fracking in a move that will damage the case for Scottish independence and be warmly welcomed by Vladimir Putin, a former Government advisor has claimed. In a blistering attack, Professor Paul Younger, who was appointed to a Scottish Government taskforce to examine unconventional oil and gas extraction, said the SNP “need not be surprised when any scientist who respects the most basic norms of professional integrity” refuses to work with its ministers in future, following comments made by the party leader in the recent election campaign. Professor Younger, who has previously been hailed by the SNP as an “energy engineering expert” and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, said he was “flabbergasted” that all but one of Scotland’s main parties were “trashing” an industry that would re-employ North Sea workers “in a far safer environment”. He added: “The Scottish offshore workforce will simply be abandoned to unemployment or, at best, to far less skilled, less lucrative jobs. The only real winner in all of this is Vladimir Putin, who cannot wait to add Scotland to the list of countries that will shortly come to depend on importing gas from Russia. Nicola Sturgeon has said she is “highly sceptical” of fracking and come under pressure from Labour, the Greens and Liberal Democrats to order a complete ban on the controversial gas extraction method. The First Minister elect said she would rule out fracking if there was “any suggestion” it harmed the environment – a shift Professor Younger said was an obvious “electoral tactic”.
Herald 11th May 2016 read more »
Britain generated no electricity from coal on Tuesday morning for what is believed to be the first time since the 19th century, in a major milestone in the decline of the polluting power source. National Grid confirmed that none of Britain’s coal stations were running between midnight and 4am. Experts from Argus Media and Carbon Brief said they believed this was the first time there had been no coal running since the era of central electricity generation began with the construction of the UK’s first coal plant in 1882. Coal was Britain’s biggest power source as recently as 2013 but is becoming increasingly unprofitable due to the carbon tax and low gas prices that favour burning gas, and the expansion of subsidised renewable sources like wind power. The UK Government has announced plans to phase coal out entirely by 2025.
Telegraph 10th May 2016 read more »
