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Posts Tagged ‘DECC’

inevitable slide into gas?

Posted in chp, climate change, energy, renewable energy, sustainability, utilities, tagged , , on May 3, 2012| 3 Comments »

Sometimes a tweet just won’t do. Yesterday I tweeted this:

DECC cnsltn out on gas gen. Um, 25% of UK elec gen lost by 2020. 20 yrs to new nuclear. No coherent RE strat. #DoneDeal #Fracking #3Degrees

…but somehow it doesn’t immediately convey the whole point. So here’s an expanded version:

DECC has today published its call for evidence  to “to inform a gas generation strategy to deliver a secure and affordable route to a low carbon economy.”
It’s lovely of them to ask. But consider the backdrop to this consultation:

  • Between a quarter and a third of current UK electricity generation capacity will come offline by the end of the decade. (It’s worth reading that sentence again – the implications are massive.)
  • New nuclear will not fill the gap. It will take at least 8 years to build each new nuclear power station and the stable of new UK nukes is struggling get out of the gates – that 8 year clock hasn’t even started ticking. In a massive setback to new nuclear, last month RWE and Npower abandoned plans for two new power stations in the wake of the collapse of the German nuclear market.
  • Without a radical change in policy, Renewables and energy storage will not grow at a sufficient rate to fill the gap.

So what does that leave us?

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CRC consultation out today

Posted in other stuff, tagged , , on March 28, 2012| Leave a Comment »

The CRC took its first official steps towards the scaffold today with the launch of the CRC consultation.

There are various steps in there aimed at simplifying the scheme, including drastically reducing the nuber of fuels (from 29 to 4) and cutting the requirements for reporting. But many, including the CBI, are asking what the point of the consultation is, given that the scheme is almost certainly destined for the scrap heap.

Given that I’ve written about this twice in a week I almost added a “CRC” category on the blog. But on second thought I don’t think I’ll bother.

 

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will “license light” boost local generation?

Posted in chp, ESCO, london, private wire, utilities, tagged , , , , , on March 13, 2012| 2 Comments »

On-site generation only works if you get good value for the energy you produce. For example, the viability of CHP (and the resulting cost of heat) depends on the price you get for the electricity you generate.

So what are your options? You could export to the grid under an offtake contract with a licensed electricity supplier. But as a small generator your electricity is almost worthless to them so they won’t pay much for it: maybe 2 or 3p. So unless you’re able to negotiate a particularly sweet contract, this is usually a non-starter.

The obvious route should be to sell energy directly to people on the site where the energy is generated. That’s supposed to be the point of distributed energy, right? (more…)

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what rate of return can I get from the PV feed in tariff?

Posted in climate change, consumerism, feed in tariff, PV, renewable energy, uncategorized, tagged on April 25, 2010| 10 Comments »

It’s taken longer than I’d hoped, but here we go:

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two roads to solving the refurb crisis – part 2

Posted in climate change, energy, engineering, ESCO, PAYS, renewable energy, sustainability, utilities, zero carbon, tagged , , , on February 22, 2010| 6 Comments »

In Whitehall, advocates of PAYS and an expanded suppliers obligation are clashing over which mechanism should be used to refurb existing housing. This is the second post of two. If you missed it, read the first part here.

Here’s a quick summary of the two mechanisms:

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two roads to solving the refurb crisis – part 1

Posted in climate change, Code for Sustainable Homes, energy, engineering, ESCO, passivhaus, PAYS, renewable energy, sustainability, utilities, zero carbon, tagged , , , , on February 14, 2010| 5 Comments »

Hitting the 80% carbon reduction by 2050 has huge implications (and costs) for the residential sector. Two strategies are emerging for dealing with these costs, each with its own potentially severe side effects.

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climate change and energy bills pass – now what?

Posted in climate change, energy, feed in tariff, renewable energy, sustainability, utilities, tagged , , , on November 27, 2008| 1 Comment »

The mighty triumvirate has received royal assent: the climate change bill (excellent), the energy bill (excellent), and the planning bill (frightening) have now become acts. So now the UK is legally bound to reduce emissions by 80% by 2050 with interim targets along the way. Within a year we’ll see feed in tariffs for distributed energy up to 5MW. And ironically, the planning bill may be used to railroad through airport expansion and new coal fired power – but let’s ignore that for now.

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big news: 80% carbon cuts and a feed in tariff

Posted in climate change, energy, renewable energy, tagged , on October 16, 2008| 1 Comment »

Ed Miliband has just made his first speech to parliament in his role as head of the DECC. In it, he said he’ll accept all of the findings of the Committee on Climate Change and will amend the climate change bill to raise the legally binding cuts from 60% to 80%. He will also amend the bill to include a feed in tariff for “small community-scale renewable energy projects” as well as microgeneration. No indication of what this means in terms of kW’s or, crucially, what level of support they’ll offer.

Excellent news. Also positive is that Greg Clark, the shadow secretary for energy and climate change, was broadly in favour of the announcements. And he criticised big Ed for not including measures for renewable heat. I disagree with him about the “renewable” part, but it’s heartening to hear mainstream politicians getting close to the crux of the issue.

More details here.

Full text and ministerial bumpf here.

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update on private wire

Posted in chp, private wire, renewable energy, tagged , , , , on October 15, 2008| 3 Comments »

Over recent weeks it’s become clearer which way the wind is blowing on private wire. Although BERR and OFGEM have set themselves an end-of-year deadline for finalising changes to the licensing regime, it’s possible to get a feel for which way they’re headed. Here are some of the key bits:

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