Europe
New European energy policy goals may include an overarching target for expansion of renewable energy, according to reports. The UK has been lobbying against a binding target, which it argues will interfere with plans to build new nuclear power plants instead of wind, solar or biomass.
Carbon Brief 17th Jan 2014 read more »
Ed Davey, the energy secretary, has called on EU heads of state to endorse a target to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 40% by 2030, but reject a specific binding renewables target. The Europen Commission is due to issue a paper next Wednesday that is likely propose a EU-wide renewables target in line with the wishes of Germany and France, but Davey, in a Guardian interview, claimed his call not to impose a binding renewables target was gaining traction. He wants EU states to have flexibility to achieve greenhouse gas emissions through a mix of non-carbon technologies including nuclear, but denied his rejection of a binding renewables target revealed a loss of confidence in the British renewables industry. Davey, who has worked energetically with a group of like-minded EU energy ministers to strike a deal, is hoping an agreement ahead of the European elections would show the virtues of co-operation in Europe.
Guardian 17th Jan 2014 read more »
The European Commission is to significantly scale back its mandatory renewable energy targets from 2020, which could undermine a key aspect of the Government’s rationale for the construction of pylons and its move towards wind energy as part of the strengthening of the national grid. The commission will next week publish a long-awaited energy and climate change proposal for EU greenhouse emissions and renewable energy targets post-2020. Leaked copies of the proposal suggest that it will refrain from imposing binding targets on renewable energy on individual member states. Defined targets of a 40 per cent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions are likely to be proposed, allowing countries the option to implement these reductions as they choose, including through renewable sources.
Irish Times 17th Jan 2014 read more »
Moorside
Nuclear new build at Sellafield could bring an economic boom to west Cumbria, experts say. Hopes that a £5bn scheme for a power station at Moorside, Sellafield, will come off were boosted when Westinghouse unveiled plans to build three of its AP1000 reactors there. The announcement on Tuesday followed the decision by its parent company, Toshiba, to take a controlling stake in NuGen, the consortium with an option to develop Moorside. If work starts as planned in 2020, 6,000 jobs will be created in the construction phase followed by 1,000 permanent jobs when the reactors are on line.
In Cumbria 17th Jan 2014 read more »
Cumberland News 17th Jan 2014 read more »
Toshiba, the 60% owner of NuGen, has announced it will build 3 AP1000 reactors at Moorside, England – much faster and cheaper than Hinkley C. But the whole proposition, writes David Toke, is seriously implausible.
Ecologist 17th Jan 2014 read more »
The boss of nuclear reactor firm Westinghouse has said it will only take four years to build each of its three reactors in Cumbria.
Building 17th Jan 2014 read more »
The Lion’s share of the work on the 3 Westinghouse reactors will go to UK companies.
Engineering & Technology 17th Jan 2014 read more »
Wylfa
Electricity chiefs have been urged to listen to “overwhelming” public opposition over controversial plans to erect pylons over the Menai Strait. Arfon MP Hywel Williams, chairman of the No Pylons campaign, has called a public meeting in Capel Rhos-y-Gad in Llanfairpwll at 7pm on Friday, January 24 to discuss the National Grid’s plan to carry electricity from the proposed Wylfa B nuclear plant.
North Wales Chronicle 16th Jan 2014 read more »
Waste Transport
Councillors are being urged to object to plans to transport 70 lorry loads of nuclear waste from South Gloucestershire to Somerset. The Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) wants waste from Oldbury Power Station to be processed and stored at Hinkley Point A. The authority said the move makes financial sense and is safe. But West Somerset Council has argued extra nuclear waste should not be brought into the area. Approximately 144 tonnes of the nuclear waste would be transported between the two sites from 2020 to 2022, the NDA said.
BBC 18th Jan 2014 read more »
Trainloads of radioactive material could be transported through Central Scotland and Perthshire on a rail service that has already been involved in accidents. Discussions are ongoing about how to move 26 tonnes of “exotic fuel”, which includes plutonium and highly-enriched uranium, from Dounreay in Caithness to Sellafield in Cumbria. This type of material is so dangerous that it can be used in nuclear weapons. Serious concerns have been raised over the proposals, as the freight trains will pass through densely populated areas. Although the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority has given assurances that the trailers are “virtually indestructible”, environmental campaigners believe there is still a significant risk to public safety. Just two days ago, a train operated by Direct Rail Services Ltd, the transport partner of Dounreay, was involved in a collision with a car at a level crossing in Cumbria. It was empty at the time, but the director of Friends of the Earth Scotland, Dr Richard Dixon, said this highlighted the risks involved. He said: “I think people are right to be concerned. There are a couple of things to be worried about – one is the fact that a train full of nuclear waste is a good terrorist target. The other thing is the possibility of accidents. These trains are well constructed and rigorously tested, but nothing is infallible.”
Dundee Courier 17th Jan 2014 read more »
Energy Costs
The American shale gas revolution is allowing companies in the United States to undercut their European rivals, despite claims to the contrary from Brussels, employers have warned. According to the leading lobby group for British manufacturers, a glut of shale gas has lowered energy costs for US manufacturers while European companies are paying more than twice the electricity price and four times as much for gas. The European Commission argues that manufacturers in Europe can cope because they are using energy more sparingly owing to higher prices.
Times 18th Jan 2014 read more »
World Nuclear
Global nuclear power use will grow 1.9% annually up to 2035, according to oil and gas giant BP. However, carbon dioxide emissions are seen to increase by almost 30% over that period.
World Nuclear News 17th Jan 2014 read more »
Fusion
The world’s biggest energy research project, the $20bn ITER nuclear fusion reactor, entered a key construction phase last month, as contractors began to pour 15,000 cubic metres of concrete into a pit in the south of France. It will house a huge doughnut-shaped machine, where scientists hope to tame the fusion reaction that powers the sun as a source of clean energy on Earth. ITER is the standard bearer in a quest to generate power by fusing together the nuclei of hydrogen atoms, which dates back to the years after the second world war. This turned out to be far harder than it was to exploit fusion in explosive form in the H-bomb. Because the potential benefits of fusion power are so great – it produces far less radioactive waste than nuclear fission (splitting heavy atoms such as uranium) and its raw materials are almost inexhaustible – the industrialised world has persi sted in the costly quest, in the face of sceptics who claim that its commercial application will always lie half a century in the future.
FT 17th Jan 2014 read more »
Green Deal
It would be, the climate minister said, the “biggest home improvement programme since the second world war” and “a massive economic and job opportunity”. But the Green Deal, launched in January last year as the government’s main way of encouraging householders to make their homes more energy efficient, has been more of a whimper than the “transformational” scheme that Greg Barker promised. While more than 100,000 people have signed up for the first stage of the deal – an assessment where an expert visits their property to see which energy-saving measures it would benefit from – a minuscule number have taken out the financing that makes the scheme unique. By the end of November, just 458 households had finished the process of having works such as new boilers and insulation installed, along with the loan that pays for the upfront cost. The scheme did not get off to a good start. Four in five people had not heard of it at its launch, despite months of ministers talking it up. Legal and IT problems dogged the first few months, as the financing at the heart of the scheme proved much more complicated to set up with individual companies than expected. Five months after its launch, only one of the ‘big six’ energy providers had fully launched a national programme offering the Green Deal. The axe now hangs over the scheme, with Labour pledging to replace it if elected, and the government conceding the scheme’s weaknesses by promising to streamline it in the new year.
Guardian 18th Jan 2014 read more »
Renewables
If, one day in the future, the UK were to have 10m electric vehicles in use and their owners all decided to put them on charge at the same time, that demand would equate to 80 gigawatts of power – the entire generating capacity available in the country today. While this may seem an extreme example of the potential challenges posed by the shift to low-carbon technology, the changes occurring in energy consumption and generation have wide-ranging implications. Microgeneration from devices such as solar panels could at certain times feed so much electricity into the grid that it would raise the network voltage to unacceptable levels, beyond those for which household appliances are designed. To mitigate such voltage rises, costly investment might be necessary – precisely what consumers who install solar panels to reduce their energy bills are anxious to avoid.
FT 17th Jan 2014 read more »
The world of energy is in a state of turmoil. Not only is the way we produce it changing, but also the way we transmit, distribute and consume it. From the wellhead to the wheel, from the power station to the light switch, the global energy industry is being refashioned in ways that could profoundly affect our lives. Much of it is driven by the fight to mitigate climate change and reduce carbon emissions. The explosion in renewables has thrown up new, often baffling challenges for energy systems the world over. The proliferation of wind farms and solar panels is putting traditional power networks under intense pressure and necessitating a whole range of new technological solutions. In Germany, for example, some 66 gigawatts of renewable capacity had come on line by the end of 2012. Yet the actual energy produced can dip to zero when the wind does not blow and the sk y clouds over. And when the wind blows hard and the sun is baking hot, the power surges are huge. So far, the global energy industry has risen to the challenges posed by ever increasing demand, changing patterns of consumption and the political imperatives of fighting climate change. But it will have to continue to innovate into the future – probably at an accelerated rate. ExxonMobil, the US energy group, expects energy demand to increase by 35 per cent by 2040 and demand for electricity to grow by 90 per cent. Given those rates of growth, the changes that energy systems have undergone over the past decade could be just the start.
FT 17th Jan 2014 read more »
Renewables – Ireland
TAXPAYERS and consumers will not have to subsidise the development of windfarms which export energy to the UK, Communications Minister Pat Rabbitte has pledged.
Irish Times 17th Jan 2014 read more »
Renewables – storage
Figuring out a way to store solar power generated on a sunny day to use when the sun is not shining, or electricity from wind farms to feed back to the grid on a still day, has been a long-sought prize for the renewable energy industry. SolarCity’s battery system is not a widely affordable answer yet, analysts say, but it could still help advance important shifts in the way energy is used. The system is being rolled out first to businesses because it is aimed at cutting a growing energy cost: the charges that utilities impose, not just for the amount of electricity a company uses, but for the level of power it needs at any point in time.
FT 17th Jan 2014 read more »
Kenya – solar
Kenya has identified nine sites to build solar power plants that could provide more than half the country’s electricity by 2016. onstruction of the plants, expected to cost $1.2bn (£73m), is set to begin this year and initial design stages are almost complete. The partnership between government and private companies will see the state contributing about 50% of the cost.
Guardian 17th Jan 2014 read more »
Solar Aid
In much of Africa, families without access to electricity rely on kerosene lamps. Expensive, unsafe and unhealthy, they also provide only a dim light. But while solar alternatives are far cleaner and cheaper, widespread use of this technology will rely on innovative forms of payment and distribution. Solar itself offers many benefits. First, eliminating kerosene lamps removes a significant source of illness. Inhaling the fumes from just one kerosene lamp is equivalent to smoking 40 cigarettes a day, according to SolarAid, a charity that is a leading provider of solar power in Africa.
FT 17th Jan 2014 read more »
Germany – renewables
The villagers of Wildpoldsried are celebrating a bumper harvest this year – not of wheat, or flax, a traditional crop in this part of southern Bavaria, but energy. The village of 2,500 inhabitants has so many solar panels, wind turbines and biomass digesters that it generates three times the energy it consumes. The surplus is sold into Germany’s electricity grid, creating a big revenue stream for the locals.
FT 17th Jan 2014 read more »
Renewables – Offshore Wind
City leaders want to capitalise on an employment boom in renewable energy by restarting a stalled project promising 800 jobs. Spanish firm Gamesa, which manufactures offshore wind turbines, announced plans in 2012 for a £125 million production base in Leith, but it was put on ice soon afterwards when the UK Government announced a review of energy markets. Now that the government has signalled a switch in subsidies from onshore to offshore developments, city economy leader Frank Ross, below, hopes to start talks with Gamesa about reviving the scheme. The move comes as latest figures show there are now 2000 people in Edinburgh and the Lothians employed in renewable energy – a five per cent increase in a year.
Edinburgh Evening News 15th Jan 2014 read more »
Microgeneration
This week’s Micro Power News: including Edinburgh Lighting Transformation; Bristol Sunniest Solar City; Exeter Solar Co-op; Southampton’s Efficiency Plan; Clydebank going solar.
Microgen Scotland 17th Jan 2014 read more »
Fossil Fuels
Ministers have been accused of overhyping the potential benefits of shale gas by using fracking industry figures that promise local communities up to £10m in cash – ignoring an independent government-commissioned report that suggested it could be as little as quarter of that. Shale gas companies have promised they will pay local communities £100,000 up front for each exploratory well that is fracked, and then 1pc of any revenues from shale gas drilling. The companies claim this could be worth £5m to £10m over the lifetime of a fracking site – likely to be at least 10 years. This is based on a report by the Institute of Dir ectors, sponsored by fracking firm Cuadrilla. But an independent Strategic Environmental Assessment report by consultants Amec, commissioned by the government and released just last month, estimates the share of the revenues would actually equate to between £2.4m and £4.8m per site.
Telegraph 17th Jan 2014 read more »
Shale gas executives and government officials collaborated in private to manage the British public’s hostility to fracking, emails released under freedom of information rules reveal. Officials shared pre-prepared statements with the industry last year before major announcements and hosted high-level dinners with “further discussion over post-dinner drinks”, while the industry shared long lists of “stakeholders” to be targeted. Critics said the government was acting as an arm of the gas industry” and was guilty of cheerleading, but officials defended the discussionsaid facilitating discussions was “right and proper” as “right and proper”. This week David Cameron said the government was “going all out for shale” and announced financial incentives for councils and local communities, labelled bribes by opponents. There have been major protests against fracking at sites across the country, and a Guardian poll last summer showed the public evenly split for and against shale gas wells near them. The emails, sent throughout 2013, are often chatty, with summer holidays discussed, and in one case the Department of Energy and Climate Change (Decc) apologises to the UK Onshore Operators Group (UKOOG): “Sorry to raise your blood pressure on this subject again, no expletives please!” following a discussion of contentious policy points. In another email, UKOOG’s chief executive, Ken Cronin, tells Duarte Figueira, head of Decc’s office of unconventional gas and oil: “Thanks for a productive meeting (it’s like being set homework).”
Guardian 17th Jan 2014 read more »
The UK’s push for shale gas will result in unavoidable changes to the countryside, the US energy secretary has warned. Ernest Moniz, who took over as energy chief for President Obama’s second term, has overseen arguably the biggest changes to US energy production since the discovery of oil. He said the exploitation of shale gas and oil on a vast scale in the US had been “transformative”, vastly reducing energy prices, boosting industry and lowering carbon emissions as more electricity production shifted from coal to gas. But he warned that any boost to the economy would come at a serious cost, as “you can’t avoid” the fact that extracting gas on such a scale involves a massive industrial effort.
Guardian 17th Jan 2014 read more »
Times 18th Jan 2014 read more »
Norway’s success in channelling its resource wealth to serve the public good is one of the wonders of the modern world. It is a model that Britain should follow if its hopes of a shale windfall are realised – hopes that have been raised by the American shale boom. In the space of a decade, US production of natural gas has increased by a quarter. Last week BP predicted that the world’s largest oil consumer will be entirely self-sufficient in energy by 2035. It will become a net exporter of gas within four years.
FT 17th Jan 2014 read more »
Forget the shale gas revolution that has transformed North America’s energy landscape. The energy of the future could lie buried deep underneath the world’s oceans and the Arctic permafrost: giant reservoirs of gas trapped in ice crystals. Sometimes called flammable ice, these methane hydrates also hold out the potential to alter trade flows and the geopolitics of energy. Countries such as Japan and India, which have no indigenous sources of conventional oil and gas, could suddenly find themselves important energy suppliers. Late last year, China announced it had identified a big gas hydrate reserve in the northern part of the South China Sea. It is very early days. Test drillings have so far taken place only in Canada and Japan, but the International Energy Agency, the western world’s energy watchdog, does not rule out the possibility of another energy revolution to r ival that of the shale boom in North America.
FT 17th Jan 2014 read more »
Geoffrey Lean: The week ahead promises a significant step over one of the defining environmental issues of the decade. When we look back on the great fight over fracking – set to be one of the defining environmental issues of the decade – this week may well mark the start of its second, and possibly most decisive, round. David Cameron announced baldly that his government was “going all out for shale”. Total became the first international oil major to join the bid to exploit Britain’s resources. And leaked documents showed that the Government had beaten EU attempts to impose legally binding regulations that ministers feared would cripple the industry at birth. With even environmentalists such as Lord Deben (aka John Gummer), the chairman of the official Climate Change Committee, urging that fracking begin as soon as possible, the Government seems to have marshalled i ts forces admirably on the military high ground. And yet ministers would be unwise to count on victory since, thus far, the big battalions have been routed by a motley collection of crusties and colonels, die-hard green activists and Conservative property owners from the shires. The first round was lost this autumn when, in the face of persistent protests, the pioneer fracking firm Cuadrilla suspended its drilling in Balcombe, West Sussex, and abandoned another controversial site – in St Annes, Lancashire. “Mate,” said Allan Campbell, the firm’s Australian founder, in an interview last month, “we are getting smashed.” Public support for fracking, which had steadily grown to more than 60 per cent before the protests began, has been sliding ever since: And, a survey by the Institution of Mechanical Engineers this week showed that, less than one in seven would be happy to have it in their areas, compared to 40 per cent only last August.
Telegraph 17th Jan 2014 read more »
