The quango cull was announced today. Quick headlines:
HCA – “Retain and substantially reform – smaller enabling and investment body working for local communities. Intend to devolve London functions to Mayor of London. Taking on regulation of social housing.”
Renewables Advisory Board – abolished
Sustainable Development Commission– under consideration
Committee on Climate Change – retained
Where the heck is is Energy Saving Trust?
Posted in climate change, renewable energy | Tagged quango | 1 Comment »
Infuriatingly, it looks like the government may mothball the Environmental Performance Standard, which would have limited emissions from new large power stations. This is despite the fact that both the Conservatives and Libdems championed the policy while in opposition.
As a result it’s likely that emissions from grid electricity will stay high for quite some time. In fact the official line is that the carbon intensity of the grid will remain roughly steady until 2015, when it will plummet towards near-zero carbon in 2040. (As an aside, is it a coincidence that the dropoff comes in 2015, given that it’s the latest possible date for the next general election?) It will be interesting to see how that drop off moves in coming years.
The announcement strongly reinforces the message from DECC that decarbonisation of heat will not be achieved through electrification. In other words, heat pumps are not the answer to decarbonising heat at the national scale.
Posted in climate change, heat pumps, renewable energy, sustainability, zero carbon | 2 Comments »
I’ve just sent this out to recruitment agents. If this is you (or someone your know who’s looking) drop me an email.
Job title: Energy consultant / project engineer
Timescale: Immediate start
Job specification
Posted in other stuff | Tagged help wanted | Leave a Comment »
It’s been a while. Loads has been happening at work – all extremely positive – and it’s been difficult to carve out any time to blog.
Anyway, as part of all this, we’ve moved to new offices. And not just to any old offices, to probably the best offices on planet earth – on Stoney Street in the heart of Borough Market. Most importantly, above the finest coffee in London (Monmouth). Continue Reading »
Posted in other stuff | Tagged Borough Market, Fontenergy, Stoney Street | 1 Comment »
Posted in climate change, consumerism, feed in tariff, PV, renewable energy, uncategorized | Tagged DECC | 10 Comments »
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Just got to the end of the leaders’ debate on ITV and there were exactly zero questions about energy, carbon, and the environment. WTF?
I’ll be in the kitchen drinking sherry and crying if anybody needs me.
Posted in other stuff | Tagged ITV, leaders debate | 3 Comments »
The feed in tariff has arrived and my inbox is filling up fast with emails from companies selling PV systems making wild claims about payback periods and rates of return. Some of them are clearly from cowboys. Some of them are from reputable companies that (unless I’ve missed something or they’re temporarily insane) should know better. In this febrile flurry of market positioning, PV may rapidly become the new double glazing.
I have to admit that I love PV. As soon as I got to know PV properly through some projects we’re doing in Italy, I fell in love. PV is the business and I have absolutely no doubt that it’s a key solution to our long term energy needs.
But you’ve got to be realistic about costs and output. The UK isn’t Italy. As a result of years of domination by very few players, the UK PV market remains immature and install costs are high. In addition, (obviously) there’s less solar radiation so outputs are lower.
So what sort of IRR is realistic? I’ll go do some graphs now.
Posted in feed in tariff, PV | 1 Comment »
In the UK we generate enough heat each year to meet the needs of every home in the country… and then we throw the heat away. So why should we promote the use of precious resources and expensive technologies to generate that heat a second time?
Posted in biomass, heat pumps, renewable energy, renewable heat incentive, sustainability, utilities | 1 Comment »
The proper way to slash carbon emissions is to tax carbon at the point of fuel extraction and let the market sort the problem out.
But because there’s no political appetite for carbon tax, we end up tinkering at the margins trying to address the emissions problem in tortuous and esoteric ways. Here’s a list I jotted down on the train on my way into the office:
All of this cost and bureaucracy becomes redundant the moment the real price of carbon is reflected in the cost of energy. Is political expediency the biggest obstacle to carbon abatement?
Posted in climate change, feed in tariff, PAYS, renewable energy, renewable heat incentive, utilities, zero carbon | Tagged carbon tax | 7 Comments »
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