Sellafield
The £70bn project to rid Sellafield, Europe’s most hazardous nuclear site, of its waste legacy is more than a decade behind schedule and is managed in shareholder, not taxpayer, interests, a damning confidential report reveals. The Commons Public Accounts Committee chair, Margaret Hodge, said yesterday that the failings at the Cumbrian plant proved how “outrageous” the decision had been to trust a private company to decontaminate the facility. The Independent on Sunday can reveal that nine of the 11 biggest projects to make Sellafield safe, including building a storage facility for radioactive sludge, are £2bn over budget. Seven will complete late, with a combined delay of eleven and a half years. The expansion of a huge waste processor, Evaporator D, is now expected in February 2016, a year and nine months later than planned. A report detailing the problems at Sellafield, produced by the accountant KPMG, runs to 292 pages and will heap pressure on the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority’s (NDA) decision last month to hand a five-year extension of the contract to clean up the site to Nuclear Management Partners (NMP). The consortium, led by US engineer URS, includes the British nuclear reactor specialists Amec. Dr David Lowry, the research consultant who obtained the report through the Freedom of Information Act, pointed out security breaches had been raised by KPMG. Since April 2012, it found there had been 11.5 “security events” per month. He said: “Sellafield actually has quite a lot of security issues that have been played down and I’m concerned that a site of that size with that amount of radioactive material has any breaches. There has to be 100 per cent security and clearly there is not.”
Independent 10th Nov 2013 read more »
Radwaste
CALLS have been made for a referendum to decide whether Cumbria should be considered to house a giant underground nuclear waste store. A veteran Carlisle politician is among those demanding that the people – not just politicians – should decide whether the county should be in the running for the controversial scheme. Liz Mallinson spoke amid increasing speculation that a fresh attempt could be mounted to house an atomic repository in Cumbria – but with the county council stripped of its power to veto a site search. She said: “I am concerned that the people of Cumbria are being disregarded. We need a referendum for the whole of Cumbria. It’s not just Copeland and Allerdale.” The search for a high-level waste store site in Cumbria was blocked earlier this year after the county council’s ruling cabinet – of which Conservative Mrs Mallinson was then a member – pulled the area out of the process.
Cumberland News 9th Nov 2013 read more »
Energy Costs
New taxes to pay for environmental schemes are being considered as part of a deal to cut household energy bills, it can be disclosed. The taxpayer would foot the bill for two of the “green” schemes, all of which are currently paid for through a levy on gas and electricity bills. The major energy suppliers have repeatedly told ministers the levies are pushing up household bills — for which they and the Government have been severely criticised. Senior Tories have held talks with the companies and believe they have secured agreement that if the largest levy, the Energy Companies Obligation (ECO), is removed, immediate cuts in prices of up to seven per cent would be announced. A deal could be struck in time to be announced as early as next month, allowing an average saving of as much as £75 a household.
Telegraph 9th Nov 2013 read more »
Geoffrey Lean: Now, it appears, the Chancellor is planning to move the bulk of the charges from energy bills general taxation. That would be much fairer, shifting the greatest weight of the burden to those best able to handle it, since tax rates rise progressively with income. But there is one snag: it will make them much more vulnerable to the Chancellor’s whim. Any chancellor might eye them up as a place to make cuts – and this one, with his zeal for austerity and his apparent dislike of environmentalism, would seem particularly likely to do so. That would be tragic, especially for the poor for most of the money goes to fund social, rather than strictly green, measures aimed at helping them pay their energy bills. Having lost out through a cynical manoeuvre by the last government, they could end up suffering again from similar heartlessness from this one.
Telegraph 7th Nov 2013 read more »
Britain’s energy giants are to offer to cut bills by up to 7pc if the Government agrees to remove the cost of multi-billion-pound green schemes. In a move which could seize the initiative from critics of the rising cost of bills, leading members of the “Big Six” energy companies have laid out two options to the Government. One would see the costs of the Energy Companies Obligation (known as the ECO scheme) removed entirely. If that is agreed, energy leaders have said they could immediately reduce bills by between 6pc and 7pc. The second option is to delay the implementation of the ECO scheme by 18 months and allow a wider range of energy efficiency measures which are not as expensive.
Telegraph 9th Nov 2013 read more »
ENERGY bills could be cut as early as next month if a deal on green taxes can be reached between Conservative and Liberal Democrat ministers. Negotiations are taking place on removing the energy company obligation (ECO), a legal requirement under which the big energy suppliers must provide energy efficiency measures to domestic customers. The ECO, which was introduced in January, costs customers an average of £53 a year, according to the Department of Energy and Climate Change. The flat-rate levy, which is added to consumer bills, ranges between £45 and £75 depending on the supplier. Ed Davey, the Lib Dem energy secretary, has indicated that he may be willing to remove the obligation from energy companies, leading to a reduction in household bills as early as next month. However, he has ruled out delaying or scrapping the scheme, meaning the £1.3bn annual cost will have to be met from general taxation raised by the government, which is legally obliged to tackle fuel poverty.
Sunday Times 10th Nov 2013 read more »
Letter: ACCORDING to Scotland on Sunday, the public now trust energy companies even less than estate agents and car salesmen. Well, why should they trust privatised multinational corporations whose primary purpose is to increase profits by any means available within the law? This is surely a case of misplaced mistrust. The real target should be the governments that have served their electors so badly by failing to establish adequate legal and policy frameworks to prevent such rampant exploitation. The fully lawful use of tax havens to minimise contributions to national exchequers while consumers face ever rising bills is but one example. The present Scottish Government is particularly culpable in this respect. They have traded on public acceptance of the mantra that “we need to do something about climate change” without demonstrating that they are doing anything other than fostering an illusion.
Scotland on Sunday 10th Nov 2013 read more »
SCOTTISH Hydro owner SSE will this week unveil a loss of about £100 million in its retail division, though it is unlikely to calm the ongoing controversy over rising household energy prices. SSE, which also trades as Southern Electric and Swalec, was the first of the major suppliers to announce tariff increases last month, raising prices by an average of 8.2 per cent. It was quickly followed by others such as Scottish Gas owner Centrica, which also reports results this week.
Scotland on Sunday 10th Nov 2013 read more »
Urenco
The UK Government’s plans to raise £3bn from the sale of uranium enrichment group Urenco may have hit a stumbling block after it emerged that the Dutch government is understood to have raised concerns about the sale of its stake. The Dutch and UK governments each own a third of Urenco, one of the world’s biggest uranium enrichment companies, while Germany’s top two utilities, RWE and E.ON, own the rest.
Telegraph 9th Nov 2013 read more »
Japan
Media attention is now turning away from the continuing contaminated water crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant to the work to remove nuclear fuel from a storage pool in the reactor #4 building. Fukushima Crisis Update 6th to 8th Nov 2013
Greenpeace 9th Nov 2013 read more »
Iran
Three days of intense negotiations in Geneva failed to reach an interim agreement to freeze Iran’s nuclear programme, despite the optimistic predictions that had accompanied the talks.
FT 10th Nov 2013 read more »
Mail 10th Nov 2013 read more »
Observer 10th Nov 2013 read more »
Telegraph 10th Nov 2013 read more »
BBC 10th Nov 2013 read more »
Iran’s president Rouhani says the nations has acted rationally, logically and tactfully during nuclear negotiations, according to the ISNA news agency. It reports that he has described the Iranian people’s rights to nuclear energy and enrichment as “red lines”.
ITV 10th Nov 2013 read more »
France warned of serious stumbling blocks to a long-sought deal over Iran’s nuclear programme as foreign ministers from the Islamic state and six world powers extended negotiations into a third day yesterday to end a decade-old standoff.
Herald 10th Nov 2013 read more »
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said on Sunday that world powers had moved closer toward a deal during negotiations with Iran on reining in Tehran’s nuclear programme and that “with good work” the goal could be reached.
Reuters 10th Nov 2013 read more »
Fusion
With a new nuclear fission power station given the green light, Professor Steve Cowley examines whether nuclear fusion could soon be a viable alternative.
Observer 10th Nov 2013 read more »
Renewables
The solar industry has been very hot. Record amounts of new solar capacity have been installed over the past two years. The accelerating pace of adoption of solar panels for distributed generation (installed at the point of use, rather than sold into the power grid) and the downward trend of module prices have created exuberance over the industry’s future. Solar has reached and eclipsed price parity with traditional fuel sources in some markets, and ultimately the potential market for solar PV is huge. A solar module costs approximately 1% of what it did 35 years ago and prices for solar pv panels have plummeted since 2010, with an average price per watt for panels falling from $1.81 in 2010 to less than $0.70 and today.
Breaking Energy 7th Nov 2013 read more »
The Scottish island of Gigha is to be the focus of a £2.5m experiment aimed at solving a major technological problem: how to store energy generated by wind, tide and wave power plants. The project, which will involve building giant batteries containing 75,000 litres of sulphuric acid mixed with vanadium pentoxide, is intended to allow power generated by the island’s wind turbines to be stored for later use. At present, while Gigha’s turbines are running, their power is used to run households on the island and excess is transmitted by cable to the mainland electricity grid. When winds are low, and Gigha’s turbines do not turn, the grid feeds power to the island. But the cable link has an upper power limit. As a result, much of the island’s excess power cannot be transmitted to the mainland and is wasted. The battery project, backed by the Department of Energy and Climate Change, is intended to get round this problem.
Observer 9th Nov 2013 read more »
Britain’s new generation of biomass power stations will have to source millions of tonnes of wood from thousands of miles away if they are to operate near to their full capacity, raising questions about the claims made for the sustainability of the new technology.
Observer 9th Nov 2013 read more »
Energy Efficiency
Many families are turning to an array of devices — some of which are free — to beat rising bills. But not all are worthwhile and in some cases it can take years before you recoup your initial costs. Analysis by the consumer group Which?, found that households could waste £535 on 10 of the most useless energy saving products. They include, “voltage optimisation devices,” which can cost as much as £300 but end up increasing bills in some cases. Instead, it found that measures such as insulation and radiator boosters offered better savings. Which? said: “The simplest measures are normally the best.” The Energy Saving Trust (EST), the advice service, agreed, highlighting measures such as chimney balloons and secondary glazing which can cost less than £100 to install.
Times 10th Nov 2013 read more »
JOHN GALLOP and his partner Sue Williams cut their energy bills from about £1,200 a year to zero after taking measures to improve the efficiency of their home — but it will take them more than 18 years to recoup the cost. Over eight years the couple, from Twickenham, southwest London, have spent more than £22,000 installing a solar thermal system to heat their water; loft, wall and floor insulation; low-energy LED lights; radiator foils; thermal blinds; and a more energy-efficient boiler. They also installed dual flush toilets and a water butt to save water. Energy bills for their two-bedroom Victorian terrace have fallen to nothing in most years.
Times 10th Nov 2013 read more »
