Hinkley
Tom Burke: Hinkley is a 20th Century solution to a 21st Century problem. Bigger is no longer better. There are faster, cheaper, cleaner and smarter ways to deliver affordable, secure, low carbon electricity to Britain’s businesses and consumers. Nothing about this deal is good for Britain’s hardworking families. They will pay the bill for decades but most of the jobs will go abroad. It is a bad deal for consumers, for the climate and bad for the country. May’s decision to go ahead with Hinkley will slow down, and increase the cost of, making this transition in Britain. It will mean we will fall behind the rest of the developed world in building a flexible electricity system fit for purpose in the 21st Century. But this is not the only problem with Hinkley. The Investor Agreement that Greg Clark will sign with EDF is an irrevocable index-linked ‘take or pay’ contract to purchase 35 years’ worth of electricity from EDF at more than twice the current wholesale price. This will cost British consumers £37bn in subsidy, four times that originally forecast (this is also twice the largest figure presented to Parliament in the Departmental Minute of October 2015 that sought authorisation to take on the liabilities of the Agreement – this raises the question of whether the government has the authority to sign the Agreement at this time). It means Britain’s electricity consumers will pay more than £1bn per year in subsidy to EDF for 35 years. It will prevent Britain’s consumers buying cheaper electricity if it would displace that from EDF. Furthermore, this deal binds future governments.
Business Green 27th Sept 2016 read more »
The board of French state-controlled utility EDF on Tuesday confirmed its approval to go ahead with the Hinkley Point nuclear project in Britain, EDF said in a statement. EDF Chief Executive and chairman of the board Jean-Bernard Levy had submitted the project to a vote again after the British government earlier this month imposed limits on EDF’s right to sell its two-third stake in the project. Under revised terms announced on Sept. 15, the government of new British Prime Minister Theresa May said it would be able to block the sale of EDF’s controlling stake before or after completion of the project — a proviso it said it would apply to significant stakes in all future nuclear projects. These conditions followed a surprise delay to the May government’s approval for Hinkley Point. The delay was announced on July 28, just hours after the EDF board had voted in favour of the project with a narrow majority. “The EDF Board has today confirmed that the conditions set out at its meeting on 28th July 2016 are met in order to sign the project contracts,” EDF said in a statement. It gave no date for a possible signature of the contracts. A signing ceremony set for July 29 had been cancelled. A source familiar with the situation told Reuters the EDF and the UK government had agreed to sign the contract on Thursday. EDF declined to comment on a signature date. EDF will also inform the British government that EDF has no current intention to make use of the first tranche of the UK state loan guarantee for the project. One source said the board approved the 18 billion pound ($23 billion) project with a 10 to 7 majority, the same as in July, when the board first approved it.
Reuters 27th Sept 2016 read more »
IB Times 28th Sept 2016 read more »
Bradwell
The UK’s Office for Nuclear Regulation has the expertise and resources it needs should it receive a request from government to assess China’s Hualong One reactor design, its chief nuclear inspector, Richard Savage, said today. ONR’s chief executive, Adriènne Kelbie, added that she sees no need for wholesale change at the organisation and that recruitment of inspectors and other staff is on target. They spoke to World Nuclear News during the International Atomic Energy Agency’s 60th General Conference being held this week in Vienna. Under a strategic investment agreement signed last October, China General Nuclear (CGN) agreed to take a 33.5% stake in EDF Energy’s Hinkley Point C project in Somerset, England as well as jointly develop new nuclear power plants at Sizewell in Suffolk and Bradwell in Essex. The Hinkley Point C and Sizewell C plants will be based on France’s EPR reactor technology, while the new plant at Bradwell will feature the Hualong One design.
World Nuclear News 27th Sept 2016 read more »
EDF
Run for your lives! 46 steam generators to 18 nuclear reactors supplied by Areva EDF greatly threaten the security of the country. Two of the four reactors of the Tricastin nuclear power plant are affected and had to be stopped. The stock exchange price of EDF fall again as forecasts of electricity production while the rating agency Standard & Poor’s lowers long-term rating of EDF considers that the risks of English EPR construction project at Hinkley Point are high.
Coordination anti-nucleaire sudest 24th Sept 2016 read more »
Brexit
The UK’s withdrawal from the EU could also force it to exit the Euratom Treaty on nuclear energy, ENDS has learned. The Euratom Treaty, which applies to all EU member states, seeks to promote nuclear safety standards, investment and research within the bloc. Although it is governed by EU institutions, it has retained a separate legal identity since its adoption in 1957. Brian Curtis, a member of the European Economic and Social Committee (EESC), told ENDS that his Committee had recently consulted the European Commission on whether Brexit would automatically lead to a UK exit of Euratom. Curtis said the Commission had responded affirmatively, arguing that the Treaty of the European Union (TEU) applies to the Euratom Treaty under article 106 of the latter agreement. This would mean, it said, that the reference to ‘Union’ inTEU’s article 50 – which needs to be invoked by member states wishing to quit the bloc – would apply not only to the EU itself but to Euratom membership as well. According to EESC, a Euratom withdrawal by the UK – which recently approved the controversial £18bn Hinkley C project – could have major strategic implications for the EU nuclear sector. “But anticipating specific outcomes at this stage is problematic,” the Committee added.
Guardian 27th Sept 2016 read more »
Energy Policy
With its choice of Hinkley Point C – a £100 billion nuclear boondoggle – its enthusiastic support for expensive and environmentally harmful fracking, and its relentless attack on renewable energy, the UK government’s energy policy is both morally and economically bankrupt, write Peter Strachan & Alex Russell. It must urgently reconsider this folly and embrace the renewable energy transition.
Ecologist 27th Sept 2016 read more »
The Renewable Energy Association has welcomed plans from Labour MPs to create 300,000 new renewable energy jobs. The organisation also highlighted the “extraordinary opportunity” the UK is facing within the renewable and clean tech industries. The comments come after shadow secretary of state for energy and climate change Barry Gardiner pledged to ban fracking and focus on creating new renewable energy jobs, at the annual Labour Party conference yesterday. Renewable Energy Association (REA) chief executive Nina Skorupska said: “The UK is facing an extraordinary opportunity to be a core player in renewable and clean tech research, finance, and deployment. We fully agree with Labour’s forecast for the potential of 300,000 jobs, at least. The industry already employs over 115,000 people and has been growing at a rate twice as fast as the economy overall. “The decentralised nature of renewables means that a variety of skilled work will be required across the length and breadth of the UK. Decentralised energy also offers a new source of savings or revenue, over a million people in the UK are already doing so through solar PV, energy storage, EV’s and other tech.”
Utility Week 27th Sept 2016 read more »
Dear Jeremy Corbyn MP, Labour Leader, I am writing to you on behalf of Radiation Free Lakeland, a volunteer group based in Cumbria to thank you whole heartedly for pledging to ban fracking which “locks us into an energy infrastructure that is based on fossil fuels long after our country needs to have moved to clean energy”. We agree entirely with the case against fracking, as well as being fossil fuel based there are also radiation risks from unleashing large amounts of radon deep underground. The nuclear industry is, like fracking, extractive and extreme. But nuclear is in a league all of its own.
Radiation Free Lakeland 27th Sept 2016 read more »
Berkeley
AFTER more than 50 years on site Magnox has bid farewell to its offices at Berkeley nuclear power station. Opening in 1961 and at its height seeing over 700 staff working on the site at any one time, the land that originally made up Berkeley Nuclear Laboratories has now been handed over to South Gloucestershire and Stroud College to be redeveloped into a university technical college. Initially established as a research and development centre for engineering, technical and radiological issues by the Central Generating Electricity Board, Magnox staff have been present at the site since the beginning.
Gloucester Gazette 27th Sept 2016 read more »
Emergency Planning
Health officials will distribute radiation-blocking pills to Cumberland (New Jersey) residents who live near the PSEG Nuclear’s Artificial Island generating complex.
NJ.com 22nd Sept 2016 read more »
Poland
At the 60th IAEA General Conference, U.S. Secretary of Energy Ernest Moniz today announced that the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), in cooperation with Poland, the Russian Federation and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), has successfully repatriated 61 kilograms of Russian-origin highly enriched uranium (HEU) from the Maria Research Reactor located in Otwock-Swierk, Poland.
National Nuclear Security Administration 26th Sept 2016 read more »
Waste to Energy
The world’s largest waste-to-biogas conversion plant is gearing up for a grand opening next spring in Northwich, using advanced enzyme technology to handle unsorted domestic waste. Around 15 tonnes of trash per hour – 120,000 tonnes a year – will be sorted at the REnescience plant in a process that will power nearly 10,000 homes, according to Dong Energy, which runs the project. The Danish energy company has invested £60m in the Northwich venture, which will use trash collections by local councils in Chester and Wigan to produce 5MW of renewable energy. Its energy conversion process works by separating organic matter such as paper and foods from other waste streams and then “washing” it free of contaminants using enzymes in a giant reactor.
Guardian 28th Sept 2016 read more »
Local Energy
New York City has set out a plan to quicken its pace of decarbonization in order to meet its emissions reduction target, as the metropolis prepares for a daunting sea level rise due to climate change. The proposals state that New York “must accelerate efforts” to expand renewable energy generation, improve the energy efficiency of buildings, transition to electric vehicles and improve waste management in order to meet its goal of cutting greenhouse gas emissions 80% by 2050, based on 2005 levels. The city has already lowered its emissions by 12% and is set to almost treble this reduction by 2030, but the road map warns that these efforts are not enough and “we must continue to do more to reduce emissions in New York City and lead progress across the globe if we are all to avoid the worst impacts of climate change”.
Guardian 27th Sept 2016 read more »
Vancouver’s switch to renewable gas fuels province-wide debate. The city says by 2050 all buildings in Vancouver will run on renewable energy. And not everyone is happy about it. The City of Vancouver’s commitment to transition away from fossil-fuel -based natural gas towards renewable energy entirely by 2050 was widely misinterpreted after accusations were made that natural gas would be “banned” and that everyone’s gas-powered appliances would need to be replaced.
CBC 23rd Sept 2016 read more »
Will-power is the key to generating green power, the leader of Plymouth Labour told conference this week, as he set out his vision for a “greener Britain”. Speaking at a fringe rally in Liverpool, councillor Tudor Evans stressed the importance of both political power and the community in tackling the country’s carbon footprint. He pointed to the city’s award winning Plymouth Energy Community coop as an example of the kind of project that councils up and down the country should be pursuing. But he also issued a stark warning about the impact of Brexit on funding for future schemes – dubbing the potential drop-off in funding as “Fexit”.
Plymouth Herald 27th Sept 2016 read more »
Boulder, Colorado, has announced its commitment to completely running on renewable energy by 2030 – making it the 17th US city to make such a pledge. The announcement comes amid a major push toward sustainable energy, as climate change becomes a leading issue in national politics. “Boulder is committed to achieving 100 per cent renewable electricity by 2030 as part of our strategy to achieve 80 per cent greenhouse-gas emission reduction by 2050,” Ms Jones said. “[It] is increasingly clear that Congress is not going to address climate change; cities like Boulder need to take the lead.
Independent 7th Sept 2016 read more »
Renewables – Solar
The Solar Trade Association has published its position paper on the interaction between solar and energy storage following a year of analysis and detailed discussions with members. At the same time, the STA is working together with Renewable UK and the Electricity Storage Network to share knowledge on the practicalities and opportunities of building renewable-linked storage projects. Its new paper is published shortly ahead of the Government call for evidence on ‘smart power’ – storage forms an important part of the ‘smart’ tools that offer much greater flexibility to grid managers and which could save consumers up to £8 billion by 2030, according to the National Infrastructure Commission.
Scottish Energy News 28th Sept 2016 read more »
Energy Efficiency
A coalition of industry-leading businesses from the building industry including AkzoNobel, Philips Lighting and Siemens have urged the European Commission (EC) to implement continent-wide action to improve the energy efficiency of Europe’s building stock. A letter addressed to the EC President Jean-Claude Juncker and Vice-President Frans Timmermans by a group of 42 representatives from the European building sector is calling for the European Union (EU) to create a clear 2050 vision which ensures that all buildings have a very high energy performance. The alliance states that a “Nearly Zero Energy” building stock by 2050 would provide an opportunity to create jobs and economic growth in line with climate change commitments set in the Paris Agreement. The letter reads: “It is clear that the Paris commitment cannot be honoured without drastically reducing energy consumption in our buildings; the EU building stock emits over one-third of our CO2 emissions, three-quarters of our buildings are inefficient, and up to four-fifths will still be in use in 2050. We need EU wide action to drive the transformation of our inefficient building stock and make it a resilient component of the energy system of the 21stcentury.”
Edie 27th Sept 2016 read more »
For the past 50 years, the UK government has issued many projections estimating future demand for energy. These have varied greatly, especially regarding the predicted market share of different fuels 15 or 20 years hence. But there is one factor every official projection has always had in common. Without fail, our governments always grossly over-estimate the overall amount of energy that will be consumed. One current example: since 2010, when the Conservative party returned to government, the Hinkley Point C nuclear power station has endlessly been justified by official threats that “without it, the lights will go out.” In practice, demand for electricity has already fallen during this decade alone by 25 terrawatt hours; that is the same realistic output that Hinkley might provide when/if it is finally built. It has not required £24bn to achieve these savings. This spring the trade body Energy UK published an in depth survey of current electricity industry opinion about their likely 2030 marketplace. Practically nobody working in the retail electricity industry is expecting any serious increases in the market’s size. Almost everybody in the supply industry reckons that demand for electricity will continue to decline overall, or at most remain constant.
Business Green 28th Sept 2016 read more »
Fossil Fuels
The billionaire hoping to become Britain’s biggest fracker has said banning shale gas would cement the decline of UK manufacturing, as he brushed off environmental concerns about the hotly disputed energy source. Speaking as his petrochemicals firm Ineos took delivery of the first ever shipment of shale gas from the US, Jim Ratcliffe addressed Labour’s announcement that it would ban fracking, which he insists could create jobs in some of the party’s former industrial heartlands. Asked about the impact fracking could have, Ratcliffe said: “I’m from the north and there are parts of the north that are not happy places.” He added that some towns that once thrived on industries such as coal or steel were now “a bit grim”.
Guardian 27th Sept 2016 read more »
George Monbiot: Do they understand what they have signed? Plainly they do not. Governments such as ours, now ratifying the Paris agreement on climate change, haven’t the faintest idea what it means – either that or they have no intention of honouring it. For the first time we can see the numbers on which the agreement depends, and their logic is inescapable. Governments can either meet their international commitments or allow the prospecting and development of new fossil fuel reserves. They cannot do both. The Paris agreement, struck by 200 nations in December, pledged to hold “the increase in the global average temperature to well below 2C above pre-industrial levels”, and aspired to limit it to 1.5C. So what does this mean? Thanks to a report by Oil Change International, we can now answer this question with a degree of precision. Using the industry’s own figures, it shows that burning the oil, gas and coal in the fields and mines that is already either in production or being developed, is likely to take the global temperature rise beyond 2C. And even if all coal mining were to be shut down today, the oil and gas lined up so far would take it past 1.5C. The notion that we can open any new reserves, whether by fracking for gas, drilling for oil or digging for coal, without scuppering the Paris commitments is simply untenable.
Guardian 27th Sept 2016 read more »
The first shipment of US shale gas has arrived in Scotland amid a fierce debate about the future of fracking in the UK. A tanker carrying 27,500m3 of ethane from US shale fields has reached Grangemouth, the site of the petrochemicals plant owned by Ineos. The tanker was prevented from docking by high winds and is now anchored outside the port in the Forth estuary. Ineos said the gas would secure the future of the plant’s workforce.
BBC 28th Sept 2016 read more »
Times 28th Sept 2016 read more »
FT 27th Sept 2016 read more »
Despite the thousands of Scottish jobs the shipments will secure and the £8 million the Scottish government has invested in the development, not a single Scottish minister attended the arrival ceremony. Sources at Ineos, which owns the Grangemouth plant, said all the relevant ministers had been invited but a Scottish government spokesman said they were too busy to attend. The divide between Ineos and the Scottish government centres on the latter’s decision to impose a moratorium on all fracking in Scotland. This will last until at least next year, and possibly longer.
Times 28th Sept 2016 read more »
Telegraph 27th Sept 2016 read more »
We are now about to use a system of gas extraction that is banned in Scotland under a moratorium because it is alleged to cause water pollution and to trigger earthquakes. Neither of these stands up to scrutiny. But that is not the point. The government considers it a potential risk and is happy for that risk to be borne by the citizens of the United States rather than by us. Hardly surprising, then, that one of Scotland’s leading geological experts, Rebecca Lunn of Strathclyde University, last year described the government’s position as “uninformed . . . ethically appalling . . . passing the buck”. The moratorium is now 20 months old, which is a long time in which to examine the evidence, not least because the evidence has been available from America for the past decade, during which every environmental group has challenged the fracking industry on its science without halting its progress.
Times 28th Sept 2016 read more »
Shale gas is good for the economy. Government should help promote its extraction.
Times 28th Sept 2016 read more »
Fracking for shale gas in the UK is the only way to arrest the collapse in British manufacturing, billionaire industrialist Jim Ratcliffe has claimed. Mr Ratcliffe, the founder of petrochemicals giant Ineos, wants to explore for shale gas across vast swathes of the UK and yesterday warned that failure to get fracking would see Britain relegated to a “fragile” service economy. Speaking a day after the Labour Party vowed to ban the controversial practice, Mr Ratcliffe appeared to appeal for working class support as he claimed shale could transform the “industrial heartlands” of the UK and revive parts of the North he said were currently “a bit grim”.
Telegraph 27th Sept 2016 read more »
The National 28th Sept 2016 read more »
While Ratcliffe concedes accidents will sometimes happen, he says fracking can be carried out safely and insists it is basic economics that it will herald cheap energy for the UK. He blames a “vocal minority” for leading opposition and says he hopes “common sense will prevail”, insisting there is “no science behind the arguments” they are making. But for his critics, such as Greenpeace, it is Ineos’s arguments that don’t stack up. Last week, the UK advertising watchdog ruled in favour of the environmental group’s assertion that most experts agree fracking won’t cut energy bills. “Ineos’s publicity stunt is riddled with overblown and outdated claims about the benefits of fr acking,” Hannah Martin of Greenpeace says. While the UK Government has so far maintained support for fracking, the SNP has imposed a moratorium on fracking in Scotland – meaning Ineos cannot explore licences near Grangemouth itself – and snubbed yesterday’s event, while the UK Labour Party on Monday pledged to outlaw fracking if it wins power. When it comes to winning the argument on the merits of domestic shale gas, it seems Ratcliffe may find headwinds that are rather harder to overcome.
Telegraph 27th Sept 2016 read more »
The boss of petrochemicals giant Ineos has come under fire for comparing the environmental damage caused by fracking to getting “a puncture in your car”, as the first shipment of shale gas arrived in the UK from the US. The comments by Jim Ratcliffe, the founder and chairman of Ineos, were described as “astounding” and “cavalier” by environmental groups and politicians, who said fracking could contaminate groundwater supplies and do unrepairable damage to the natural world.
The i 27th Sept 2016 read more »
Herald 28th Sept 2016 read more »
BILLIONAIRE Ineos chief Jim Ratcliffe has challenged Nicola Sturgeon to cross the Atlantic to witness the benefits of fracking as the first ever shipment of US shale gas arrived in Scotland. The chairman and founder of the chemicals giant, which owns the Grangemouth industrial complex, also suggested the SNP is pandering to a “vocal minority” by refusing to back his plans to begin fracking in the central belt and expressed “disappointment” at SNP ministers for snubbing his celebration of a project he said would secure 10,000 jobs. The first of what will become weekly shipments of shale gas, extracted in Pennsylvania, arrived in the Firth of Forth yesterday and the industrialist insisted fracking had prevented Grangemouth, which is vital to the Scottish economy and infrastructure, from closing down.
Herald 28th Sept 2016 read more »
AN SNP MP has admitted that he will continue to oppose fracking even if research commissioned by Nicola Sturgeon proves the controversial gas extraction technique to be entirely safe. Martyn Day will today witness the first ever shipment of fracked gas from US shale fields arrive in Scotland when a huge purpose built ship docks at chemical giant Ineos’s Grangemouth industrial plant, the largest employer in his Linlithgow and East Falkirk constituency. While SNP ministers are to snub the event and protestors are expected at the site, Mr Day will attend and said he welcomed the arrival of fracking gas from America because the new supply line, which will ensure regular deliveries for years to come, will secure “real jobs” in the area. But he i nsisted he will continue to oppose the method in Scotland, rejecting a claim from Jim Ratcliffe, the billionaire Ineos boss who wants to establish a fracking industry across the central belt, that welcoming overseas imports of shale gas while opposing it at home amounted to hypocrisy.
Herald 27th Sept 2016 read more »
OUR oil industry is clinging on to its presence in the North Sea in the hope that prices will rise and the glory days of sumptuous profits will return. Our oil billionaires no doubt dream of their past successes as they lounge in their mansions or pontificate on issues of national identity. The Chancellor of the Exchequer would gasp a sigh of relief if another £330 billion-plus oil tax windfall came his way. But it’s all a sad oil pipe dream. The game is almost up. The special relationship we, allegedly, have with the US, when they are not shunting us to the back of the trade deal queue, has been to no purpose. In fact the opposite is the case. One of the primary reasons for the loss of 120,000 North Sea-related jobs is the squalid fer vour in the US to make a fast buck out of exploiting their oil and gas shale beds. This impact of the US shale gas rush on oil prices cannot be overstated. The resultant low oil price has brought our North Sea industry to its knees. Now, to add insult to injury, we see the totally unacceptable spectacle of shipload after shipload of shale gas in the form of ethane about to be landed in the UK and Europe from America. Ineos, the company awarded the majority of licences for a possible UK onshore fracking frenzy, believes its investment will bring US shale gas economics to Europe. Ineos has long planned for shale gas to be brought across oceans in ships so we can enjoy the fruits of this US-inspired new economics. Why on earth has the UK Government accepted this situation? Are they happy for another 200,000 North Sea related jobs to disappear to the detriment of Scotland? More North Sea jobs will disappear and, more importantly, untold social damage will be inflicted on countries which try to copy the US fracking gamble, unless a halt is called to onshore fracking.
The National 28th Sept 2016 read more »
Bill McKibben, the US environmentalist who is one of the world’s foremost authors and activists on issues of global warming, does not mince his words. “We have to check the power of the fossil fuel industry,” he says. “It’s going to take an immense amount of work, but if we don’t win, then there won’t be any future.” In an interview with Climate News Network, McKibben said that oil majors such as ExxonMobil and Shell show no signs of rethinking their policies or re-ordering their activities. “They are digging deeper and choosing to ignore what’s going on,” he warned. “Recent work by investigative journalists shows that ExxonMobil knew all about climate change and its effects on the world 40 years ago.
Climate News Network 28th Sept 2016 read more »
