Politics
Greg Barker has spoken of his determination to encourage a “decentralised power to the people energy revolution” made up of households and businesses producing their own energy. Addressing the Conservative Party conference today, the Energy and Climate Change Minister said there are already more than half a million local energy systems installed in homes and businesses and growing this sector can challenge the dominance of the Big Six energy suppliers, bringing down energy bills. Barker was particularly enthusiastic about solar energy technology, which today accounts for around 2.5GW of installed capacity. He insisted the failing costs of solar, as well as technologies such as combined heat and power, geothermal, biomass, energy from waste and hydro power, were driving jobs and growth.
Business Green 30th Sept 2013 read more »
Greg Barker’s Speech.
Conservatives 30th Sept 2013 read more »
In 2007, George Osborne said this: “Rather than green policies stifling economic growth, it is clear that the converse is true: a strong economy can go hand in hand with environmentalism. Britain is falling far behind other countries when it comes to taking advantage of the vast new green technologies market.” But the electoral arithmetic has changed since the Conservatives failed to win an outright majority in 2010, and the Chancellor’s main concern now seems to be keeping the climate change sceptic fringe of his party onside. The really stunning thing, however, is how in his speech to the Conservative party conference on Monday, Osborne repeatedly applied the no-brainer logic of investing for the future and keeping at the forefront of science and innovation to every sector of the economy bar the green one.
Guardian 30th Sept 2013 read more »
George Osborne’s Speech.
Conservatives 30th Sept 2013 read more »
The Chancellor George Osborne dismissed the idea that there would be no new nuclear power stations built under the current government. In his speech to the Conservative Party conference he said: “Should we, the country that built the first civil nuclear power station, say: ‘we are never going to build any more – leave it to others?’ Not on my watch.”
Construction News 30th Sept 2013 read more »
Cameron: “On fuel bills specifically, I think we have to explain: Look, we want competitive fuel prices, not for 20 months [a reference to Miliband’s proposed price freeze], we want them for 20 years and what that means is you have got to make the market more competitive, you’ve got to access new sources of energy like unconventional gas, you’ve got to make sure that consumers are put on to the lowest tariffs. You’ve got to look at the causes of high bills rather than just simply say something about the fact of high bills, a policy it seems to me which actually unravelled within about 12 hours of it being announced. In the end, Labour’s problem is that no one trusts them to run the economy, and I think last week can’t have done them any good.” By putting energy prices at the heart of the political debate, Miliband has raised a series of interconnected issues. Osborne is known to have been increasingly impressed by the former chancellor Lord Lawson’s more sceptical view of the orthodoxy on global warming – an orthodoxy reaffirmed last week by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. I ask Cameron if he, too, has shifted his ground on greenery. “I’m certainly not more Lawsonian. It’s worth looking at what this report this week says – that [there is a] 95 per cent certainty that human activity is altering the climate. I think I said this almost 10 years ago: if someone came to you and said there is a 95 per cent chance that your house might burn down, even if you are in the 5 per cent that doesn’t agree with it, you still take out the insurance, just in case.”
Telegraph 28th Sept 2013 read more »
The environment secretary has told the Tory conference there are advantages to global warming, but he appears to be viewing the problem through a narrowly British lens.
Guardian 30th Sept 2013 read more »
Independent 1st Oct 2013 read more »
Professor Kevin Anderson, of Manchester University, told the Independent: “His view that we can muddle through climate change is a colonial, arrogant, rich person’s view.” And Professor Myles Allen of Oxford University, one of the authors of the report, said: “I find it very worrying that this person is charged with adapting [Britain] to climate change. I do think it is a good idea for whoever is planning for adaptation to have a realistic understanding of what the science is saying.”
Telegraph 1st Oct 2013 read more »
Labour leader Ed Miliband’s conference party announcement about freezing electricity prices has prompted some commentators to claim UK energy policy is now in crisis. And they’re probably right – but crises can present opportunities for profound policy change. This might just be what is required to fix the UK’s dysfunctional energy system. UK energy policy has become increasingly complex and full of inherent tensions – between addressing price issues, delivering renewables and other important investments and security of supply – for some time now. Under the current political model, DECC and Ofgem have few resources, little ability to change the system, little access to energy market data, and have to rely on energy companies to implement energy policy. Current structures reinforce embedded corporate power in the UK. By understanding why structures matter – and why current structures underpin deep tensions between corporate power and delivering energy policy goals – we can start to understand why the UK energy policy is under-delivering. It all leaves energy policy open to Ed Miliband’s critique and voters delighted with talk of price freezes and a dismantling of energy companies.
Carbon Brief 30th Sept 2013 read more »
NuGen
The decline worldwide of the nuclear renaissance may well have reached the shores of West Cumbria as evident by the recent conflicting statements in the media about the future of NuGen’s project to build new reactors adjacent to Sellafield. a prospective new player in the NuGen project appeared in early 2012 in the shape of the Japanese (Toshiba) owned company Westinghouse who were keen to get their AP 1000 reactor sold and in use in the UK, though it expected to seek additional funding from cash-rich Chinese state-owned nuclear groups. The latest twist in this saga of claim and denial is that China’s SNPTC is in talks to buy the NuGen site provided it receives Government assurances ‘that it will one day be able to build Chinese-designed nuclear stations in Britain’. Where this leaves Westinghouse – and what Confucius would have made of it all – is anyone’s guess, but the bottom line is that if the project on land adjacent to Sellafield does eventually goes ahead, its cosmopolitan developers will be devoid of any UK participation at corporate level. Should it fail, it will have lived up to its locally bestowed name of Doomrise – an anagram of the Moorside title chosen by NuGen.
CORE 30th Sept 2013 read more »
Imagine a world where the repressed Chinese people are marching in the streets opposing nuclear power – while the supposedly free British citizens are encouraged by government to meekly submit to yet another nuclear CONsultation aiming to bury hot nuclear wastes in leaky geology. Imagine a world where a repressive regime will take notice of public opinion and scrap plans for a nuclear development while a supposedly democratic government will try to bypass public opinion by dealing only with a few unrepresentative patsys in borough councils. Sounds mad? It is mad! And it is happening right now.
Radiation Free Lakeland 30th Sept 2013 read more »
Nuclear Regulation
A team from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) are visiting the UK today to review ONR’s regulatory effectiveness. The Integrated Regulatory Review Service is the third mission to the UK and will focus on areas not looked at during previous missions including waste management; decommissioning; radioactive sources; radiation protection and lessons from Fukushima.
ONR 30th Sept 2013 read more »
Emergency Planning
A NUCLEAR accident response exercise will be staged in Devonport this week. As a routine part of the Ministry of Defence and Plymouth City Council’s contingency planning, a one-day nuclear accident response exercise will take place tomorrow. Codenamed Exercise Short Sermon, the event is designed to test the procedures in place for dealing with a nuclear reactor accident involving a nuclear-powered submarine at Devonport Naval Base. During the day personnel from approximately 27 agencies will be responding at operational, tactical and strategic levels in Plymouth, Truro and Exeter.
Plymouth Herald 1st Oct 2013 read more »
Energy Costs
SSE, the country’s second-biggest energy supplier, yesterday added fuel to the controversy over Labour leader Ed Miliband’s plan to freeze prices by declaring that its retail division made a loss in the six months just ended. But the firm made it clear that investors would not suffer, and it still plans to increase its dividend by more than inflation. George Alexander, the finance director, said: “Despite the intensifying political debate, we will maintain our operational and financial discipline to enable us to deliver an above-inflation increase in the dividend for this financial year and beyond.”
Independent 1st Oct 2013 read more »
The Government is contemplating scaling back its environmental commitments to help stem rapid price rises in gas and electricity, the Energy Minister Michael Fallon disclosed on Monday night. Speaking at the Independent fringe meeting, he delivered a withering assessment of Ed Miliband’s promise at last week’s Labour conference to impose a 20-month post-election freeze on the cost of energy. Mr Fallon warned the move would deter major energy companies from crucial investment in Britain.
Independent 30th Sept 2013 read more »
Michael Fallon, the energy minister, has said it would be “unfair” to add further costs and green levies onto consumer bills. The comments are the strongest indication yet that the Conservatives may pledge to scale back existing green policy costs, as the party scrambles to counter Ed Miliband’s energy price freeze plan. “Piling further costs and green levies on to energy bills is unfair to consumers,” said Mr Fallon at a reception by industry body EnergyUK at the Conservative Party Conference. “We shouldn’t put British industry at a disadvantage against Europe and the US: for our manufacturers this would be assisted suicide.” The Conservatives are understood to be reviewing all policies that are currently paid for through energy bills and looking at further exemptions from policy costs for SMEs and industry. A new system of subsidies for nuclear power plants and wind farms, devised by the Coalition, will also be paid for by levies on energy bills. Households and businesses will have to pay £7.6bn a year toward building greener power plants by 2020 – about £95 per household – up from £2.35bn now. Mr Fallon argued on Monday night that Labour’s pledge of a 2030 target for decarbonising the power sector – which would require an even greater deployment of green technologies such as wind farms – would “threaten our recovery”.
Telegraph 30th Sept 2013 read more »
Ian McCaig, chief executive, said a price freeze would pose “significant risks” to First Utility, which supplies 195,000 customers, unless allowances were made for rising policy costs and spikes in wholesale prices. “A policy like this is potentially materially problematic for an independent provider,” he said. “Bluntly, it could put me under.” Stephen Fitzpatrick, managing director of Ovo Energy, another small supplier, also criticised Labour’s price freeze plan, saying he did not think it would work or help consumers, as suppliers would simply raise prices before or after the freeze. Another small energy supplier, Co-operative Energy, last week said it supported Labour’s price freeze policy.
Telegraph 30th Sept 2013 read more »
The boss of one of Britain’s biggest energy companies has threatened to scrap billions of pounds of investment in new power stations and electricity networks if Ed Miliband’s plan to freeze utility bills goes ahead. The written warning from Keith Anderson, the chief corporate officer of ScottishPower, to the Labour leader is the industry’s most explicit threat yet over the consequences of the Opposition’s controversial policy, announced last week.
Times 1st Oct 2013 read more »
Keith Anderson’s letter.
Times 1st Oct 2013 read more »
Scottish Power 1st Oct 2013 read more »
US
Here’s a look at what you need to know about nuclear power plants in the United States. There are 104 commercial nuclear power reactor units licensed to operate in the U.S. These operate in 31 of the 48 contiguous states. The nuclear power reactor units provide the U.S. with 20% of its electricity.
CNN 30th Sept 2013 read more »
Japan
Four tonnes of potentially contaminated water has leaked from the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant in Japan. The rainwater escaped as workers at the site transferred radioactive waste between two holding tanks. Tokyo Electric Power Co (Tepco) has been trying to contain contaminated water at the Fukushima site after it found 300 tonnes of radioactive water had leaked out of a tank at the plan.
Mirror 1st Oct 2013 read more »
Slovakia
UK-based engineering and project management company AMEC has received a contract for a major environmental impact assessment for a new 1,000MW nuclear power station at the Bohunice site in Slovakia. Awarded by the Nuclear Energy Company of Slovakia (JESS), the unspecified, three-year contract represents a key strategic development for the company’s nuclear business in Central and Eastern Europe and also significantly increases its portfolio of activities in the region.
Energy Business Review 30th Sept 2013 read more »
Germany
At decisive moments in her political career, Angela Merkel has stood out for courageously breaking with the past. She may very well be about to do so again. Germany should start considering the prospect of a coalition between her Christian Democrats, which won handsomely at this month’s elections, and the Green party. This may shock outsiders, who often think of the chancellor as a safety-first candidate. But consider her record. In 1999, she called on Helmut Kohl, the national reunifier who then still towered over her party, to resign. Then, in 2011, after the Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan, Ms Merkel ended the decades-long run of nuclear power in Germany. Again, many people, especially in conservative circles, were shocked. But she got her way. A third opportunity to prove her mettle could present itself if she selects the Green party as her preferred coalition partner. She would shock many conservatives. But Ms Merkel, a former environment minister, regards the energy-environment issue as key for the future. After all, she initiated the Energiewende, the transformation of the energy sector that is now under way in Germany.
FT 30th Sept 2013 read more »
Renewables
IKEA has revealed plans to sell solar panels at all of its UK stores, as it seeks to tap into the burgeoning home energy generation market. The Swedish retailer confirmed today that it had signed a deal to sell Hanergy’s latest thin film photovoltaic panels at all of its 17 UK stores, following a pilot at its Lakeside store in Essex, where one solar panel is now sold every day.
Business Green 30th Sept 2013 read more »
Guardian 30th Sept 2013 read more »
Independent 30th Sept 2013 read more »
Merrill Lynch, EY and Aviva are among a group of major investors urging George Osborne to introduce a 2030 target to decarbonise the UK’s power sector into legislation. In a letter timed to coincided with the Chancellor’s speech at the Conservative Party conference today, the coalition of companies overseeing more than a trillion pounds of assets argue the absence of such a target is preventing the UK attracting the £110bn it needs to overhaul its creaking energy infrastructure and bring on new, low carbon power sources.
Business Green 30th Sept 2013 read more »
Energy Efficiency
Luciana Berger: Labour have announced that we will overhaul the Green Deal and replace it with a new ‘Energy Save’ scheme. Neither will we be continuing with the Energy Company Obligation (ECO) in its current form, which is due to expire in March 2015. The Green Deal is failing. Since its launch, only 384 households have signed up for a package and just twelve have gone live. Most importantly, 99 per cent of the 71,000 households who have had a Green Deal assessment have not gone on to take out a plan. And at the current rate of 13,000 homes being assessed each month, it would take 160 years to survey all the homes in the UK. That just isn’t good enough. Not when ministers promised at least 10,000 households would be signed up by the end of this year and forecast the scheme would renovate 14 million homes by 2020. Caroline Flint led a visit to Germany, where 360,000 people took out energy efficiency loans from their KfW state investment bank last year at interest rates of just 1 per cent. Here at home Nationwide’s Green Additional Borrowing service allows its existing mortgage customers to take out loans for energy efficiency improvements for as little as 2.29 per cent interest. As well as cheaper loans, we will also be looking at a more efficient, affordable and less bureaucratic replacement for the Energy Company Obligation (ECO) for when it comes to an end in 2015.
Business Green 30th Sept 2013 read more »
