Shuffling the deckchairs

The government looks set to change the levels at which they fix prices for electricity. It seems that hard pressed consumers are going to hand over less cash to onshore wind and solar operators but more to offshore ones.

Chief Secretary to the Treasury Danny Alexander described the shift in subsidy as "a rebalancing" and said overall spending would not change.

But Labour said "chopping and changing" pricing was bad for business.

As you can see it is fairly clear that all the big three political parties remain committed to ever-rising energy prices.

Disaster Davey

Ed Davey was up in front of the Energy and Climate Change Committee today for the committee's regular look at the department's work. Tim Yeo was back in the chair, which always adds a certain frission to events.

There was a very interesting exchange (from 15:37) when Philip Lee, who is a very perspicacious questioner of witnesses, asked the minister to comment on the big cumulative losses made by the big energy suppliers and wondered whether this was sustainable. What arrangements, Lee asked, had DECC put in place to deal with the fallout if, say, EDF went belly up.

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Sounds a bit off

Last week I discussed the work of Mike Stigwood on windfarm noise and the fact that the windfarm lobby had managed to nobble the Institute of Acoustics inquiry into the issue.

Today, a report in the Telegraph not only provides some confirmation of Stigwood's story, but also reveals that the green lobby's attempts to corrupt the policy process went even further than that. It seems that they also gained access to DECC officials and, a cynic might think, managed to get them to alter the official guidance on windfarm noise.

Internal energy department emails released following a freedom of information request show the lobby group met ministry officials, after which it was assured that “the majority of R-UK’s input” was “reflected in the guidance”.

Both the Government and the report’s author said last night that RenewableUK had not influenced the advice, but the emails raise new questions about the Coalition’s openness over its wind farm policy.

 The FOI request on which this story was based is here. 

[Update:the FOI reveals that DECC were using a wind-industry acoustician, from RES].

Greenery kills the environment part 20

Photo: A Weir under CC. Click for link.Earlier this week it was reported that Stirling Council has decided to oppose Dart Energy's plans to expand their coalbed methane operations in Airth.

The project actually spans two separate council areas, and the other one - Falkirk - has yet to pronounce, so the project is still alive, but the decision is presumably a setback.  The scaremongering campaign by Friends of the Earth Scotland and Frack-Off seems to have had an effect. Nevertheless, the council's decision is actually rather surprising, as Dart have their European headquarters in Stirling. If the company can't operate in their own back yard, one can't help but wonder if they might decide to move the business elsewhere, perhaps closer to their operations in England. I suppose though that Stirling councillors are unconcerned about the loss of an important employer in the area - this is Scotland after all.

Meanwhile, it is reported today that Ineos, the operators of the Grangemouth chemicals site, just up the road from Airth, are going to go ahead with their plans to supply their plant with a feedstock of LNG, shipped  from the USA.

So we can see that Friends of the Earth (and the other groups that claim to be concerned about the environment) have managed to work things so that instead of gas being sourced locally it will be shipped halfway round the world.

This will, apparently, help to 'save the planet'.

Green fracking dilemma

Prominent green groups in Scotland have (inadvertently) called for fracking to take place north of the border as soon as possible.

Well, kind of.

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Green fairies

One sometimes wonders if members of the House of Commons Environmental Audit Committee inhabit a sort of a green fairytale land. It seems as if no policy measure is ever too silly to find its way into their recommendations or an opinion too cockeyed for them to adopt.

As an example, take their report on energy subsidies, published today, which boldly declares that fossil fuels are subsidised by some £12bn per annum in the UK.

Globally, subsidies for fossil fuels exceed $500 billion a year. They are inconsistent with the global effort to tackle climate change, providing incentives for greater use of such fuels and disincentives for energy efficiency. Energy subsidies in the UK are running at about £12bn a year; much directed at fossil fuels. There is no single internationally agreed definition of what constitutes energy subsidy, which has provided a way for the Government to reject—erroneously, in our view—the proposition in some areas that it provides energy subsidies.

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Labour demand higher energy prices

Readers may remember that I mentioned the launch of Labour's green paper on energy last week. At the time, I made a cursory and ultimately fruitless attempt to find the document in question, and at least  one BH reader reckons it is in fact illusory.

Having dug a bit further, I have come across mention of a "ten-point plan", for example this analysis at the Carbon Brief. So I wonder if the green paper is in fact simply ten soundbites jotted down on a napkin by Ed Miliband and Captain Flint. If so, then it's a pretty damning indictment the level of thought involved in Labour's thinking, although perhaps not overly surprising as one looks at the body count that has resulted from the party's last time in office.

And as you look at point 9 on the plan, you see that the party is quite determined that prices will go higher still:

Set a 2030 power sector decarbonisation target to boost investor confidence.

Winter deaths? What winter deaths?

The new friends of the people

David Rose has the must-read article this morning, trying to work out just how much the greens - the new friends of the people - are going to cost us at the end of the day.

Yes, £50 may be being cut from bills.  But astonishingly, there’s still another £300 billion of projected increases from green commitments to go.

They make Ed Miliband’s pledge to freeze bills meaningless. For this, we must thank primarily his own biggest legislative achievement – the passage, when he was Energy Secretary, of the 2008 Climate Change Act.

Another snuffle in the trough?

Tim Yeo seems to have wangled himself one last desperate chance to prolong his political career - having been thrown out by the leadership of his constituency association he has thrown himself upon the tender mercies of the members instead. It seems that there will be a vote on Yeo's future.

Tim Yeo, à la carte - Josh 248

Tim Yeo has to go.

Cartoons by Josh

Foe Yeo must go

There were no doubt scenes of wild revelry in South Suffolk last night with the news that the local Conservative Association has decided that they do not want Tim Yeo to be their MP any longer.

A statement from the association, issued last night, said: “The executive council of the South Suffolk Conservative Association met on the evening of Friday, November 29 and voted not to re-adopt Tim Yeo for the 2015 general election.

“Mr Yeo is now considering his position and will advise the executive council of his intended course of action.”

Of course he remains an MP and, despite having been recorded telling a lobbyist that he had coached a parliamentary witness, he remains the chairman of the Energy and Climate Change Committee, after constructing some doubt for the Parliamentary Standards Commissioner to give him the benefit of.

And of course, with a past as (ahem) colourful as his, Yeo is probably in prime position to be elevated to the House of Lords. We wait expectantly.

Update on Nov 30, 2013 by Bishop Hill

David Rose notes that Yeo has made something like £400,000 from his green directorships since 2009. Amazing that people would pay so much money to the mere chairman of the Commons Energy and Climate Change Committee.

More Wiz from the Kidz - Josh 247

In a bid to outdo the 10:10 campaign the SkS kidz have launched a Hiroshima app. What a great idea!

H/t Watts up with that. And there is a related video by Bob Tisdale here.

Cartoons by Josh

The boy who never grew up

I'm not sure if that's Tinkerbell or Captain Flint behind our Ed. (D Catchpole under CC; click for link)

It's hard to credit the idea that anyone could imagine that the Labour party is fit to hold office. Their pledge to freeze energy prices, delivered apparently off the top of Ed Miliband's head, has had the remarkable effect of doing enormous damage to the hopes of keeping the lights on even while Labour remains in opposition. That's quite an achievement and one shudders to think what destruction they might reap if they were actually in power.

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From the Top. It's Secret - Josh 246

And this isn't a cartoon about this story which Nigel Lawson never talked about in the Spectator.

Glad that's settled.

Cartoons by Josh

Counting the cost

Updated on Nov 29, 2013 by Bishop Hill

The theme of this morning seems to be shale gas, and what effect it's going to have on prices, and there is still a distinct lack of clarity about which shale plays are being discussed in relation to the European market.

Lord Browne, former head of BP and now the chairman of Cuadrilla was offering up his views on the subject in London last night, saying that shale is not going to reduce prices in the UK. This is a view that we hear a lot, and seems to be based on the Poyry report that was discussed here a few weeks ago. However, as I understand it, this report looked at the effect of exploitation of the Bowland on UK gas price, concluding that because the UK is connected to mainland Europe by a number of gas pipelines the benefits of the gas would be shared with our European friends. Prices would therefore only be expected to fall by 4%. 

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