In the FT. The title doesn’t match the content. “This revolution could prove to be a Faustian bargain. Care needs to be taken over how – and how swiftly – the technology is introduced: environmental costs might prove heavy.”
Solarcentury
The company I founded in 1998 to design and supply solar energy solutions for the built environment. Solarcentury
Solar Aid
The charity I founded in 2006, with a 5% contribution of Solarcentury profits, to help deliver solar lighting to Africa. Solar Aid
Archive for the ‘Gas’ Category
“End the Big 6 Energy Fix” public campaign launches.
February 10, 2012 Clean Energy, Coal, Gas, Nuclear, OilCaroline Lucas speaking for 100 public figures: “First, we are calling on the Government to impose a similar levy to the one it has imposed on North Sea oil companies and the big banks. Over time, such a levy could raise billions, revenues that could be ring-fenced and used to ensure that every home is insulated and highly energy-efficient – starting with the homes of the fuel-poor. This would form part of a Green New Deal and would help to create thousands of new skilled jobs. Second, to prevent energy companies from passing the cost of any levy on to customers, we want the Government to give Ofgem the power to cap prices. This could be linked to the wholesale price to make energy prices fairer. Third, we want the Government to launch a public inquiry into the Big Six energy companies.”
Is Russia behind anti-fracking protests and ban in Bulgaria?
February 4, 2012 GasOilPrice.com: “Last month 166 members of the Bulgarian National Assembly’s 240 parliamentarians voted to impose an indefinite ban on shale gas exploration and extraction in Bulgaria using hydraulic fracturing or other similar technology. Now a hard-hitting editorial in the Trud newspaper by Ivan Sotirov entitled, “Russian Lobby Against Shale Gas,” accuses pro-Russian Bulgarian supporters of fomenting protests against shale gas operations in the country.”
Exxon shale gas wells fail in Poland.
February 1, 2012 GasTwo exploratory wells drilled in a Polish shale formation last year weren’t commercially viable, ExxonMobil admits. Poland’s shale formations hold 187 trillion cubic feet of recoverable gas, according to an April 2011 assessment by the U.S. Energy Department: enough to supply domestic consumption for 322 years.
“Fracking boom could finally cap myth of peak oil:” investment banker.
February 1, 2012 Gas, OilA Citicorp investment banker professes that the gas (fracking) revolution will spread to oil. “Maybe” is the comment from Conoco Phillips CEO Jim Mulva.
FT: “Radiant outlook for energy sector” …meaning gas.
January 20, 2012 Clean Energy, Finance, GasThe S&P 500 is having its best start since 1987, especially in energy stocks, after a disappointing 2011, wherein when the single worst-performing share was First Solar A short on the shares was the most profitable position in 2011 for some hedge funds, such as Greenlight. “Many future deals will focus on traditional energy. But many others will also involve bets tied to the new technologies around gas generally – and shale in particular – in part because of such uncertainty” (as the Arab Spring aftermath and the Iranian sanctions).
Big 6 UK energy companies had 4 million complaints in 2011.
January 12, 2012 Coal, Gas, NuclearBill mistakes and inaccurate readings caused the most anger, a Which report finds. It makes the front page of the Daily Mail.
Ohio earthquake probably caused by fracking wastewater.
January 4, 2012 GasSo a seismologist studying a magnitude 4.0 event concludes.
JL blog: Energy dramas for 2012.
January 2, 2012 Clean Energy, Climate, Coal, Finance, Gas, Nuclear, Oil2011 was a year of growing polarisation for those of us who long for renaissance fuelled by renewables. The Germans announced targets to run their railway system entirely on renewable energy, mostly wind,and solar. Yet BP announced it will quit solar entirely to pile ever further into tar sands, unconventional gas and the rest of the carbon status quo. The IEA pronounced that the cost of energy will rise “viciously” on a global basis without clean energy. Yet the British “Big Six” opted for so much gas that the installation rate of British renewables fell steeply: this despite conventional UK energy prices soaring so steeply that fully 1 in 4 of UK households fell into fuel poverty in 2011, up from 1 in 5 in 2010.
There were so many of these stark contrasts in the theatre of energy last year.
It seems that the closer renewables advocates get to their dream, the harder the defenders of the status quo push back the other way, notwithstanding the increasingly clear economic, environmental and social downsides. They surely are teeing up some dramas for 2012.
Not to mention interesting research material for neuroscientists interested in how dysfunctional human cultures work. Its not as though Big Energy, and their cosy nexus with conventional capital, just do these things and be done with it. They lobby for their short-term perceived interests – hard, and mostly below the radar – entraining many in officialdom and politics to their ruinous causes.
To the extent that solar energy in cloudy Britain might be a tiny-corner microcosm of a much bigger picture of the potential for renewable-powered renaissance, there is a particularly interesting drama unfolding as we enter 2012. In case you missed it, the British High Court ruled on 21st December that the UK government has acted illegally in proposing a retrospective reduction in the solar feed-in tariff. The arguments for and against were summarised that night on the BBC, here (headline and 7 mins 20 secs in for the detail). The government can appeal by January 4th, risking further humiliation in its efforts to cut back a solar market just a tiny fraction the size of Germany’s. Or it can switch tack, resurrect an industry that was creating thousands of jobs – at net economic benefit to the UK economy – in a time of dire need for such, while realigning with some its core strategic themes, not least a Big Society countering austerity-related unemployment with a domestic green industrial revolution. This will be a choice to watch as the dramas in the triple crunch of financial crisis, climate crisis, and energy crisis roll on in 2012.
Rebuilding the UK’s energy system by 2050: costs about the same for clean or conventional energy, DECC says.
December 28, 2011 Clean Energy, Coal, Gas, NuclearEvery person in Britain will need to pay about £5,000 a year between now and 2050 on rebuilding and using the nation’s entire energy system, new DECC figures suggest. The cost of developing clean and sustainable electricity, heating and transport will be very similar to replacing today’s conventional power stations. The forecasts come from a unique open-source analysis package, called the 2050 pathways calculator, created by Professor David MacKay, DECC chief scientific adviser. Guardian: “However, the cost of the “do nothing” option does not include the damage to the economy expected as a result of climate change, and the calculator notes that, according to the landmark Stern review: “This is the equivalent of up to £6,500 per person per year on average, on top of the cost of the energy system”.”
“Energy firms accused of treating clients with contempt as complaints leap”.
December 9, 2011 GasConsumer Focus says complaints against ‘Big Six’ suppliers have risen by 26% over the last three months despite their promises to rebuild trust. EDF, RWE and E.On fared worst.
EPA blames Wyoming groundwater pollution on fracking.
December 9, 2011 GasIn so doing they have set off a fresh round of calls for curbs on the controversial technique.
Big 6 demands for up-front payments are a barrier to new UK manufacturing.
December 6, 2011 GasGuardian: “The government’s hopes of rebuilding the economy with a “march of the makers” risks being derailed by energy companies that are demanding huge upfront payments to power new factories. Soaring energy prices, which are already hitting homeowners, are also forcing manufacturers to shut down plants or relocate their factories to other countries. The British Ceramic Confederation said some members have been asked to pay deposits of up to £200,000 – the equivalent of four months’ worth of power – before energy firms are willing to take them on as customers.”
Big 6 bosses earn millions as their customers bills soar.
December 6, 2011 GasGuardian: “The Big Six energy companies have walked into a political storm over executive pay amid revelations that their bosses are earning up to £4m a year as an increasing number of their customers are being pushed into fuel poverty.”
EDF and other Big Energy firms have loaned 50 employees to government.
December 5, 2011 Clean Energy, Coal, Gas, OilThe Guardian reveals that at least 50 employees of companies including the Big 6 have been placed within government to work on energy issues in the past four years: free of charge and working within the departments for secondments of up to two years. “There have also been 195 meetings between ministers from the Department of Energy and Climate Change (Decc) and the energy industry between the 2010 general election and March 2011, according to a Guardian analysis of declared meetings with Decc.” Caroline Lucas: “Companies such as the big six energy firms do not lend their staff to government for nothing – they expect a certain degree of influence, insider knowledge and preferential treatment in return. … None of the staff on secondment in Decc work for renewable energy companies. … Secondments also work in reverse, with civil servants going to work in the energy industry, such as a two-year secondment to Shell and another to Horizon Nuclear Power, a joint venture of E.ON and RWE npower that aims to build nuclear power stations in the UK.”
UK renewables projects tumble as Big 6 dash for gas.
December 4, 2011 Clean Energy, GasGuardian: “The construction of new renewable energy generation capacity has fallen dramatically, as the big six energy suppliers pursue a “dash for gas” policy that could put the UK’s climate change targets out of reach and leave households with higher bills.” Wind projects are down by half on last year. Less than a GW of wind has been approved and 30 GW of gas is at planning stage.
Big Energy firms accused of profiteering, again.
December 2, 2011 Gas, NuclearNew analysis for the Guardian by Manchester University shows a progressive widening between wholesale and retail prices.
More than a quarter of UK households are in fuel poverty after Big 6 energy price rises.
December 1, 2011 Gas, NuclearWith households spending 10% or more of income on home heat and electricity up from nearly one in five households last year to one in four now (4.1 million), the government looks set to miss its statutory obligation to eliminate fuel poverty by 2016. It now looks certain to fail to meet its legal duty. And these estimates were calculated before the huge prices rises announced last summer by the Big 6. New calculations, provided by Consumer Focus and seen by the Guardian, based on actual bills, show the figure for England alone is now over 5 million households. In the summer price hikes the biggest supplier, British Gas, put its gas and electricity prices up by 18% and 16%, meaning an average annual dual-fuel bill for its 9m customers has risen from £1,096 to £1,288. Price rises have averaged 21% since last year. Over the past five years, average prices have gone up 88%. Some 2.5m people are already in debt to their energy supplier. “Excess” winter deaths are already running at 27,000 a year.
Enron-type speculation back in play in energy markets.
December 1, 2011 Finance, Gas, OilEnron was a high risk hedge fund disguised as a diversified energy company and some 500 companies had been approved by regulators to trade energy at the time it blew up 10 years ago. It took down Mirant, NRG, NEG and Calpine with it. Now, says Julian Dumoulin-Smith, director of equity research in the Electric Utilities & IPPs Group at UBS Securities, there is a growing queue of groups interested in trades beyond physical assets: Constellation Energy, Mercuria, Arcadia Petroleum, Glencore, RWE, EON, EDF. As one commentator says, its almost come full circle.
Shale gas exploitation would take UK way over carbon allowance.
November 23, 2011 GasScientists from the Tyndall Centre warn in a report commissioned by the Cooperative Group that exploiting even a minor proportion of the UK’s reported shale gas resource would generate so much carbon dioxide that the government’s greenhouse gas emissions targets would be rendered unreachable. Paul Monaghan, head of social goals at the Cooperative: “The calls from ‘big gas’ for the abandonment of renewables targets must be rebuffed, and here is the science to do just that.” The report also found that the amount of investment needed to exploit gas reserves – about £32bn – would be enough to build 2,300 offshore wind turbines, which would produce enough renewable energy to meet government targets.
Investors ask BoE to probe risk that fossil-fuel reserves pose “sub-prime” risk.
January 19, 2012 Climate, Coal, Commentaries, Finance, Gas, OilFossil fuel reserves listed in the City of London are “sub-prime” assets posing a systemic risk to economic stability. So warns a high-profile coalition of investors, politicians and scientists , writing an open letter to Sir Mervyn King asking him to launch an investigation. Signatories include Aviva Investors, Climate Change Capital, Conservative politician Zac Goldsmith and Solarcentury chairman Jeremy Leggett. Abatement policies could mean billions of pounds of fossil fuel reserves will rapidly lose value and cause a “major problem” for institutional investors and pension funds. Guardian: “CarbonTracker’s latest report reveals that coal reserves held by 16 London-listed companies will release 45bn tonnes of CO2 when burned, equivalent to 86 years of annual UK emissions, which are the tenth highest in the world. Most of the coal is in other countries such as Australia and South Africa.”
Tags: Banks, UK