Nuclear Subsidies
Why is it proving so difficult to close the deal on new nuclear in Britain? In part, of course, there is the normal arm wrestling negotiation. This is focused on the so called “strike price” – an energy price below which the suppliers will get compensation from the state – and on the allocation of risk around a £14bn construction contract. The UK government wants a strike price of around £65 to £70 per MWh which is high but probably politically defensible. They well remember that in 2008 EDF talked about a price of £45 per MWh. EDF now wants something between £95 and £100, but they can probably afford to accept the Government’s figure and still make a reasonable profit. The allocation of the risks is even more important than the strike price. Unless the Government is careful it could end up paying enormous sums for capacity which is underused because cheaper supplies will be available to consumers. If the company gets it wrong, a bad deal would overhang its finances for decades. The negotiating process is not being helped by an amateurish public relations campaign on behalf of the company. One day the message is that the deal is almost done; the next that the company is about to down tools and walk away. This causes a mixture of amusement and irritation in Whitehall. Threats and attempts to bounce through decisions do not go down well. EDF would not dare to deal with the French Government in this way. But the real problem is deeper and not specific to the UK. Nuclear has come to look like yesterday’s technology. The development of new nuclear stations is a desperately slow process. If built, Hinkley Point will take at least twice as long from conception to commission as the whole of the London Olympic Games. Partly this is about the safety requirements which are now platinum plated and include an approval process which is painfully slow espec ially in approving what is a well-established reactor design.Furthermore, energy technology is moving very quickly. Shale gas will not be the last major breakthrough. So who knows where the sector will be by 2020? The extended timescale locks consumers into a decision which could soon be overtaken by events. So nuclear is beginning to look unfundable as a private sector investment. Which private investors want to tie up $14bn of capital for more than 10 years?
FT 2nd April 2013 read more »
Energy Bill
Ed Davey, the energy secretary, is looking at making changes to proposed industry reforms, amid claims they will entrench the dominance of the “big six” power companies by forcing independent generators out of the UK energy market. The move marks another chapter in the difficult history of the energy bill, which has been more than two years in the making. The bill is the centrepiece of government efforts to lure £110bn of investment into the energy sector and shift the UK away from polluting fossil fuels towards a low-carbon economy. Ministers have long claimed the bill will help bring new entrants into a market dominated by the six biggest utilities – Eon, RWE npower, Centrica, EDF Energy, Scottish Power and SSE – which supply most of the country’s electricity and gas. But independent green power generators in the UK, many of them due to make big investments in renewable power, fear the bill will make it so hard for them to sell their electricity they may be forced out of the country. The generators’ concerns centre on the way the energy bill will phase out existing renewable energy subsidies that encourage electricity suppliers to get a certain amount of power from green generators, and replace them with a system of long-term agreements, known as “contracts for difference”. The contracts will guarantee prices for low-carbon generators, including nuclear plants and wind farms. They say this means power suppliers – typically the big six or other large European utilities – will no longer offer them viable terms for the long-term power purchasing agreements that underpin independent renewable energy plants.
FT 2nd April 2013 read more »
Hinkley
A PARTY-POLITICAL slanging match has broken out over why Taunton is failing to reap any significant benefits from the £14bn Hinkley Point C project. As reported, the Taunton and Wellington area were conspicuous by their absence in the list of places set to benefit from Energy Secretary Ed Davey’s approval of the plans. Whether the project goes ahead depends on the deal energy company EDF strikes with the Government over the price it will get for the power generated by the plant. In Taunton, despite hopes local companies will benefit – and £660,000 has been promised to mitigate the impact of a saturated rented housing sector – little else seems to be happening.
This is the West Country 2nd April 2013 read more »
THE Campaign to Protect Rural England is urging the Government to “make more money available” to stop the Somerset Levels being spoiled by giant pylons. The CPRE wants the Government to step in to ensure a subsea route is used to connect electricity from Somerset’s third nuclear power station at Hinkley Point C with a substation near Avonmouth.
This is the West Country 2nd Aporil 2013 read more »
Radhealth
Patterns of long-term health risk reduction after levels of environmental hazards decline have been documented, but are still not precisely understood. Nuclear plant shutdowns that eliminate radioactive emissions and reduce toxins in the environment and food chain have been previously linked with significant short-term declines in local infant deaths and child cancer cases. The Rancho Seco nuclear power plant in Sacramento County, California, USA ceased operating in June 1989; no other operating reactor exists within 200 miles of the site. We examine official California Cancer Registry data on cancer incidence for Sacramento County vs. the entire state, using the last two years of reactor operation (1988-1989) as a baseline; the Registry began in 1988. Temporal trends are given for Standard Incidence Ratios of all cancers combined, and by gender, race/ethnicity, common types of cancer, and child cancer. Since the late 1980s, cancer incidence in Sacramento County has declined for 28 of 31 categories (genders, races, types of cancer); 14 of these declines are statistically significant and two others borderline significant. The estimated reduction in cancer cases in the county over a 20-year period is 4,319. Many factors can result in lower cancer incidence over two decades, but elimination of radioactive isotopes should be addressed in future reports as one of these potential factors.
Biomedicine Journal 27 March 2013 read more »
Nuclear vs Fossl Fuel
Nuclear power is often promoted as a low-carbon source that mitigates fossil fuel emissions and the resulting health damage and deaths caused by air pollution. But is it possible to provide estimates and actually quantify these effects? A new paper from NASA’s Goddard Institute authored by Pushker Kharecha and James Hansen in the journal Environmental Science and Technology purports to do just that. Hansen is well known as one of the founders of modern global warming science. The authors come up with the striking figure of 1.8 million as the number of lives saved by replacing fossil fuel sources with nuclear. They also estimate the saving of up to 7 million lives in the next four decades, along with substantial reductions in carbon emissions, were nuclear power to replace fossil fuel usage on a large scale.
Scientific American 2nd April 2013 read more »
Protest
The climate campaigners should be given a medal for their outstanding bravery and public service, not prison sentences.
Guardian 3rd April 2013 read more »
Germany
Germany exported more electricity to neighbouring countries than it imported last year despite a government decision to scrap nuclear power in favour of an ambitious drive towards renewable energy.
Telegraph 2nd April 2013 read more »
Japan
Fukushima Crisis Update 29th March to 1st April.
Greenpeace 2nd April 2013 read more »
Consumers will be able to choose power suppliers that offer lower rates from 2016 following a Tuesday decision by the government to liberalize the electricity retail market. In a set of electricity system reforms approved by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s Cabinet, the government also seeks to lead major utilities to separate power generation and transmission businesses between 2018 and 2020. The liberalization of the electricity retail market is a significant reform that will create a more competitive market, allowing diversification of services and prices, through the breakup of major utilities’ regional monopolies on household electricity.
Japan Times 2nd April 2013 read more »
North Korea
Since the latest UN sanctions, North Korea has unleashed a salvo of threats against the US and South Korea, even vowing to restart operations at its main nuclear complex. The BBC examines how much of a threat North Korea really poses to the US and its Asian neighbours.
BBC 2nd April 2013 read more »
North Korea has said it plans to restart its main atomic complex, a move that could bolster its nuclear arsenal and add to tensions in the region. The regime said on Tuesday that it would restart all facilities at its main Yongbyon nuclear complex to ease its electricity shortage and strengthen its nuclear capability. The reactor was shut down in 2007 as part of international nuclear disarmament talks that have since stalled.
Guardian 2nd April 2013 read more »
FT 2nd April 2013 read more »
Trident
Letter: Ed Miliband is right to include defence in the current Labour party policy review, and Angela Smith and John Woodcock are out of order to suggest that the policy is settled (Our deterrent is good value, 1 April). It’s about time the country had a defence policy based on the highest risks that we face. According to the government’s national security strategy review, these are terrorist attacks, cyber-attacks and environmental challenges, particularly flooding. A state-on-state nuclear attack does not figure as a significant risk at all, so questioning commitment to the Trident replacement programme is highly responsible and appropriate.
Guardian 2nd April 2013 read more »
Letter: It has long been a mystery whom the British nuclear deterrent is supposed to deter. We know from past experience that it does not deter Argentina or al-Qaida or Chinese cyber warriors. Britain is too far away and insignificant to be of any concern to North Korea, and Iran has other enemies closer to home to worry about. We do not seriously feel threatened by either Pakistan or India. Since nothing has been done about nuclear proliferation, it may be that some decades hence we shall fall out with a nuclear-armed Fiji or Guatemala, but such a danger is minuscule compared with that of climate change, which we have yet to tackle with the seriousness it needs.
Guardian 2nd April 2013 read more »
Letter: Congratulations on another excellent April Fool this year. Two Labour MPs urging support for Trident! You nearly fooled me for a moment – but the use of the phrase “bang for buck” in this context gives the game away – especially on the day that the latest round of spending cuts come in. But a rib-tickler all the same – great stuff, and you’ll have to go some way to find something more preposterous next year.
Guardian 2nd April 2013 read more »
Renewables
Increasingly countries and regions are leapfrogging timid renewable targets and moving toward full 100% integration of renewables into electricity supply. Some thought leaders, politicians, and advocates are moving even further, suggesting 150%, even 300% renewable electricity generation to meet not only electricity supply but also heat and transport.
Renew Economy 3rd April 2013 read more »
Decentralised Energy
Ivan Illich’s ‘Energy & Equity’ shows how large-scale energy systems entail inequality, unfreedom, and loss of human dignity. The workfare debate between Aaron Peters and Tony Curzon Price ignores this crucial social and environmental dimension. Do we wish to live in a society where we are all autonomously free and equal, where we have choices as to how we wish to live, albeit with democratic control on high energy consumption and technological innovation, less automated labour, and fewer material goods in general? Or would we rather live in an unequal, unfree – and ultimately inhuman society where choice is regimented, limited and prescribed and where a minority have ever more – and innovative – material goods, personal services and leisure opportunities, predicated ultimately on automated labour and cheap energy; a world in which some provide cheap labour, and those are not even that fortunate are propped up by workfare?
Open Democracy 31st March 2013 read more »
Fuel Poverty
Over the last decade successive Governments have failed to tackle the growing fuel poverty crisis caused by rocketing energy bills. There are now over 5 million households suffering and over 8 million households could be in fuel poverty within 4 years. The human cost is horrendous. Over 7,000 people die every year from living in cold homes and illnesses related to fuel poverty cost the NHS over £1 billion each year. In fact the UK has the worst fuel poverty levels of any country in western Europe.
Friends of the Earth 27th March 2013 read more »
Fracking
The warning came after demonstrations took place at the weekend in Stirling against international drilling company Dart Energy’s plans to drill in 22 wells on 14 sites in the Forth Valley. Last year Dart was granted exploratory licences by two councils as part of its £300 million deal to supply gas to energy giant SSE. However, Mike Ferrigan, who is leading the fight against the project, said coal-bed methane extractions would be harmful to the environment and to human life. He said the protests, backed by Friends of the Earth and Greenpeace, would continue until “the drilling companies packed up and went home.
Herald 1st April 2013 read more »
