Energy price cap

Matesrates

Well-known member
As you all must know, October and then January are going to see massive rises.

Does anyone know what it’s for and who benefits from the increase.
 
As you all must know, October and then January are going to see massive rises.

Does anyone know what it’s for and who benefits from the increase.

I know I should know the answer to this, but I don’t.
Can HMG change the way the price cap operates in any way to protect the public?
It seems a severe rise in one type of energy (gas/oil obviously in this case) floats the boats of all energy supply companies including renewables etc. by increasing the money they all get for the units they all supply even if their own costs haven’t gone up.
Is there any way of altering the current price cap system to change this??
 
I know I should know the answer to this, but I don’t.
Can HMG change the way the price cap operates in any way to protect the public?
It seems a severe rise in one type of energy (gas/oil obviously in this case) floats the boats of all energy supply companies including renewables etc. by increasing the money they all get for the units they all supply even if their own costs haven’t gone up.
Is there any way of altering the current price cap system to change this??
They must do as the next set of rises are unsustainable
 
We don't need price caps.

Everyone will be able to afford gas and electricity when Miz-Trust's tax cuts go through.
 
Jeeze. We're currently paying £284 a month
From Oct that will be £514
From Jan it'll be £611

It was £170 a month last year.
 

Attachments

  • Screenshot_20220810-102321.png
    Screenshot_20220810-102321.png
    348.5 KB · Views: 3
Is there any way of altering the current price cap system to change this??

Not easily, either the intermediary companies go bust, or the gas generators stop producing because the gas they use costs more than they can sell the electricity for (at which point they go bust), about the only thing the government can do is super-tax the renewables generators and re-distribute the profits, but that's only ever going to have a marginal effect.

Unfortunately, the reality of "net-zero" and the rush for renewables has left us excessively reliant on gas and intermittent supplies such as wind rather than a more balanced and secure mix of gas/nuclear/coal, which means when the wind doesn't blow and the price of gas goes through the roof we're left in a situation like this.

I wonder how quickly we could build a coal power station, or convert some of our existing gas stations to burn the same.
 
Not easily, either the intermediary companies go bust, or the gas generators stop producing because the gas they use costs more than they can sell the electricity for (at which point they go bust), about the only thing the government can do is super-tax the renewables generators and re-distribute the profits, but that's only ever going to have a marginal effect.

Unfortunately, the reality of "net-zero" and the rush for renewables has left us excessively reliant on gas and intermittent supplies such as wind rather than a more balanced and secure mix of gas/nuclear/coal, which means when the wind doesn't blow and the price of gas goes through the roof we're left in a situation like this.

I wonder how quickly we could build a coal power station, or convert some of our existing gas stations to burn the same.
Maybe the UK should have built more wind farms. New on-shore projects have halved since 2015 when the Tories pledged to stop new wind farms being built to pander to their middle class, privileged NIMBY voters whose biggest problem is their view from their village farm house.

Conversely, Im equally as pissed off at seeing a video from Nick Clegg in 2010 resurfacing this week saying something along the lines of 'theres no point in nuclear when we can't use it for another 10 years'. Welp. Unfortunately that could actually be the case now as to meet targets to limit global warming ghg emissions need to drop drastically in the next few years, and nuclear now can't be built in time and it is massively expensive and is destined to go over budget and over time, something people don't want to admit. However I would still crack on anyway for a more day to day weather resistant sustainable backup option in decades to come.

The answer should simply be that Government should be taxing the shit out of these companies earning record windfalls. A 25% tax barely scratches the surface. Fossil fuels still dictate prices until renewables become the majority supply, which they aren't. So we just need to ride out this crisis with support from the Government.
 
Maybe the UK should have built more wind farms. New on-shore projects have halved since 2015 when the Tories pledged to stop new wind farms being built to pander to their middle class, privileged NIMBY voters whose biggest problem is their view from their village farm house.

UK total installed capacity is 24.6gw, it's currently producing a touch over 3gw up from a bit over 2 earlier today and installing more capacity doesn't help if the wind isn't blowing.

The problem with wind is that when it doesn't blow, it's useless, so it has to be backed up with coal or gas (nuclear can't do that for economic reasons), and installing more capacity doesn't.


The answer should simply be that Government should be taxing the shit out of these companies earning record windfalls. A 25% tax barely scratches the surface. Fossil fuels still dictate prices until renewables become the majority supply, which they aren't. So we just need to ride out this crisis with support from the Government.

That's part of the answer, at least for the UK's gas production, the problem is that quite a lot of the gas comes from Norway, or the United States, and those windfalls are very much out of the UK's reach.
 
UK total installed capacity is 24.6gw, it's currently producing a touch over 3gw up from a bit over 2 earlier today and installing more capacity doesn't help if the wind isn't blowing.

The problem with wind is that when it doesn't blow, it's useless, so it has to be backed up with coal or gas (nuclear can't do that for economic reasons), and installing more capacity doesn't.




That's part of the answer, at least for the UK's gas production, the problem is that quite a lot of the gas comes from Norway, or the United States, and those windfalls are very much out of the UK's reach.
We aren't 'maxed out' on wind production, by building more farms we can spread out across more varied areas in the UK and get better coverage. The south coast, for example, barely has any onshore wind farms, and it is currently windier there. But volatility is obviously a massive issue of course, I completely accept that. But we haven't mentioned solar yet, which tends to rise as wind declines, as we are obviously in the summer. 23% of our energy today (live) is coming from solar. 10% from wind. So our renewable power hasn't declined, that's in line with the yearly average (just solar and wind have swapped places). We should have more tidal power, which the UK is uniquely suited for, but is largely ignored. We should have more nuclear. These are failures.

The issue I have here is trying to blame 'net zero' and advocating for a return to the absolutely distrous use of coal. Coal decline in the UK was already well underway before climate change was even widely accepted, and decades before net zero was a thing. Natural gas was cheaper, and its rise in the 90s is directly correlated to steep declines in coal. It's not renewables that cannabalized the coal market, it was gas. Granted, the complete closure of coal since 2015 has been accelerated by government policy in aid of net zero, but this was really the last few percent of an already dying industry.
 
Last edited:
But we haven't mentioned solar yet, which tends to rise as wind declines, as we are obviously in the summer. 23% of our energy today (live) is coming from solar.

They're not likely to be producing much of anything later on today, and it's quite possible to have still days in winter, in which case renewables drop off a cliff completely.

The biggest problem with renewables is that they're in direct competition with nuclear, both share the same economic model of high capital cost, low operating cost, in which case they only make sense if they can sell all of their output onto the market, so you can have one, or the other, but not both.
 
When I was a lad, and that’s a long, long time ago, I don’t remember ever being really cold. No central heating, just coal fires which due to chimney design, warmed the whole house. Yes when you went to bed it was cold at first and yes you wore a jumper, but it was ok. Of course the issue is carbon emissions, but surely with modern technology that can be mitigated
 
They're not likely to be producing much of anything later on today, and it's quite possible to have still days in winter, in which case renewables drop off a cliff completely.

The biggest problem with renewables is that they're in direct competition with nuclear, both share the same economic model of high capital cost, low operating cost, in which case they only make sense if they can sell all of their output onto the market, so you can have one, or the other, but not both.
Well it's a good job that energy demand plummets to a fraction of peak when solar starts to stop producing electricity at night. Once we develop more storage systems too, especially in wind, which the Tory government has put massive roadblocks in front of, this problem will be largely solved.

I don't understand your 'renewables compete with nuclear' point at all. If the Government wanted to build more nuclear plants and renewable farms they could. The idea that you can't have both is based on what exactly?
 
When I was a lad, and that’s a long, long time ago, I don’t remember ever being really cold. No central heating, just coal fires which due to chimney design, warmed the whole house. Yes when you went to bed it was cold at first and yes you wore a jumper, but it was ok. Of course the issue is carbon emissions, but surely with modern technology that can be mitigated
Insulation. That's the technology. Insulate houses.
 
Well it's a good job that energy demand plummets to a fraction of peak when solar starts to stop producing electricity at night. Once we develop more storage systems too, especially in wind, which the Tory government has put massive roadblocks in front of, this problem will be largely solved.

Not in winter it doesn't, and storage is miles away from being practical at the moment.


I don't understand your 'renewables compete with nuclear' point at all. If the Government wanted to build more nuclear plants and renewable farms they could. The idea that you can't have both is based on what exactly?

Economics, both have high capital costs and low operating costs, they only make sense if they can sell all the energy they generate at a reasonable price, too much of both and the market price for their energy collapses to zero.
 
Not in winter it doesn't, and storage is miles away from being practical at the moment.




Economics, both have high capital costs and low operating costs, they only make sense if they can sell all the energy they generate at a reasonable price, too much of both and the market price for their energy collapses to zero.
This isn't how it works. There is an auction for contracts when a company wants to build a wind farm. The price is therefore fixed for the length of the contract and provides long term security. It is not affected by supply and demand economics. If the wholesale cost is cheaper than agreed to once it's up and running, the Government subsidies it, if it's more expensive, the company gives money back to the Government.

Just last month the Government awarded contracts worth a record 11 gigawatts energy with 8 being wind. With electricity costs soaring, these companies will be paying billions back to the consumer over the next few years. This is on top of the estimated 11bn expected to be paid back from profit surpluses by 2028.
 
This isn't how it works. There is an auction for contracts when a company wants to build a wind farm. The price is therefore fixed for the length of the contract and provides long term security. It is not affected by supply and demand economics. If the wholesale cost is cheaper than agreed to once it's up and running, the Government subsidies it, if it's more expensive, the company gives money back to the Government.

The same basic economics applies regardless of whether the price is fixed or not.


Just last month the Government awarded contracts worth a record 11 gigawatts energy with 8 being wind. With electricity costs soaring, these companies will be paying billions back to the consumer over the next few years. This is on top of the estimated 11bn expected to be paid back from profit surpluses by 2028.

I thought your complaint was they weren't doing enough wind, or is your complaint that they're not putting enough of it up in the south just to p*** off the southerners.
 
The same basic economics applies regardless of whether the price is fixed or not.




I thought your complaint was they weren't doing enough wind, or is your complaint that they're not putting enough of it up in the south just to p*** off the southerners.
How can basic economics apply to a fixed price? It's literally controlled for supply and demand. If wholesale prices were to somehow lower to a very low price, the wind companies are subsided. You said they only make sense if they can sell at a reasonable price. Well that price will never change after they sign the contract. So the idea we can't build both nuclear and wind is nonsense. In fact, we are are doing precisely that. And this is the short to medium term solution. We are well aware of the need for a flexible 100% renewable energy grid and plans are in place to deliver that. Batteries in homes that store electricity during the day. Interconnectors with other countries where we send surplus when we have it and receive surplus from others when we need it, plus many other plans.

As for my criticism of Government projects, I can acknowledge that we are certainly pressing on with increasing renewable production, while criticising decisions which mean we are behind where we could and should have been by now.
 
Maybe the UK should have built more wind farms. New on-shore projects have halved since 2015 when the Tories pledged to stop new wind farms being built to pander to their middle class, privileged NIMBY voters whose biggest problem is their view from their village farm house.

Conversely, Im equally as pissed off at seeing a video from Nick Clegg in 2010 resurfacing this week saying something along the lines of 'theres no point in nuclear when we can't use it for another 10 years'. Welp. Unfortunately that could actually be the case now as to meet targets to limit global warming ghg emissions need to drop drastically in the next few years, and nuclear now can't be built in time and it is massively expensive and is destined to go over budget and over time, something people don't want to admit. However I would still crack on anyway for a more day to day weather resistant sustainable backup option in decades to come.

The answer should simply be that Government should be taxing the shit out of these companies earning record windfalls. A 25% tax barely scratches the surface. Fossil fuels still dictate prices until renewables become the majority supply, which they aren't. So we just need to ride out this crisis with support from the Government.
Maybe Tony & Gordon should have thought about what was going to replace the coal fired power stations they closed with indecent haste.
 
How can basic economics apply to a fixed price? It's literally controlled for supply and demand. If wholesale prices were to somehow lower to a very low price, the wind companies are subsided. You said they only make sense if they can sell at a reasonable price. Well that price will never change after they sign the contract. So the idea we can't build both nuclear and wind is nonsense. In fact, we are are doing precisely that. And this is the short to medium term solution. We are well aware of the need for a flexible 100% renewable energy grid and plans are in place to deliver that. Batteries in homes that store electricity during the day. Interconnectors with other countries where we send surplus when we have it and receive surplus from others when we need it, plus many other plans.

As for my criticism of Government projects, I can acknowledge that we are certainly pressing on with increasing renewable production, while criticising decisions which mean we are behind where we could and should have been by now.
Main issues with Nuke seems to be little proven reliable technology (see Hinckley Pt and French attempts) and 10 yrs plus minimum to build. I’m not anti btw. We should aim to be self sufficient somehow.
 
Maybe Tony & Gordon should have thought about what was going to replace the coal fired power stations they closed with indecent haste.
Coal production in the UK had fallen from a peak of 290 million tonnes to 48.5 million by the time Blair took over. It had halved already just in the 7 years of the 90s before he became PM. So I think you're a bit off here.
 
How can basic economics apply to a fixed price?

It all gets factored in during the bidding process, the "fixed price" doesn't just appear out of thin air, the bidders know how much the project will cost, they know how much electricity they'll generate, divide the former by the latter, add on a bit of a margin and that's the fixed price.

The fixed price relies on them always being able to sell all the electricity they generate, if instead you have so much capacity installed that they can only sell half and have to be on idle half the time, the "fixed price" needs to be double what it would otherwise have been, or the government needs to promise to pay them whether they're generating or not, which on close examination is the same thing.
 
Coal production in the UK had fallen from a peak of 290 million tonnes to 48.5 million by the time Blair took over. It had halved already just in the 7 years of the 90s before he became PM. So I think you're a bit off here.
No reason to doubt your figs Foggy, but someone a lot more clued than me on the energy front once told me that the move away from the coal fired was driven largely by a need to be seen to be leading on climate change. That driver blinkered their views on what was to come next and only a narrow range of views was solicited which backed up their decision. Coal production was on a downward curve but we could have imported. Anyhoo, bit late now.
 
It all gets factored in during the bidding process, the "fixed price" doesn't just appear out of thin air, the bidders know how much the project will cost, they know how much electricity they'll generate, divide the former by the latter, add on a bit of a margin and that's the fixed price.

The fixed price relies on them always being able to sell all the electricity they generate, if instead you have so much capacity installed that they can only sell half and have to be on idle half the time, the "fixed price" needs to be double what it would otherwise have been, or the government needs to promise to pay them whether they're generating or not, which on close examination is the same thing.
The government does pay wind farms to turn off. They are called constraint payments. It cost 260m last year, a few extra quid onto our bills a year. A drop in the ocean compared to how much we will get back. And again, this is short term until storage solutions develop.

Quite why this means we can't have nuclear as well, still don't understand. Renewables will increase, natural gas will drop. Nuclear may remain somewhere between 15-25% of the energy supply if the government does build more as they have recently indicated they will. Electricity demands are going to grow massively as we electrify our heating systems and transport industry. A lack of demand is certainly not going to be a problem.
 
No reason to doubt your figs Foggy, but someone a lot more clued than me on the energy front once told me that the move away from the coal fired was driven largely by a need to be seen to be leading on climate change. That driver blinkered their views on what was to come next and only a narrow range of views was solicited which backed up their decision. Coal production was on a downward curve but we could have imported. Anyhoo, bit late now.
This only applies to the final 15% or so of our energy supply which we cut over the last few years. As I said, coal had already reduced massively in the UK before 'being Green' was trendy. I mean think about it, the most famous attack on coal by any PM was Thatcher, and she certainly wasn't trying to look green. And this last bit was cut out by Tory governments, not Blair. The decision to completely cut off coal by this decade was made in 2015.

And thank God it was. Continued use of coal is disastrous. And importing it wouldn't help right now either , coal prices have increased way more than natural gas, nearly double the amount.
 
The government does pay wind farms to turn off. They are called constraint payments. It cost 260m last year, a few extra quid onto our bills a year. A drop in the ocean compared to how much we will get back. And again, this is short term until storage solutions develop.

Quite why this means we can't have nuclear as well, still don't understand. Renewables will increase, natural gas will drop. Nuclear may remain somewhere between 15-25% of the energy supply if the government does build more as they have recently indicated they will. Electricity demands are going to grow massively as we electrify our heating systems and transport industry. A lack of demand is certainly not going to be a problem.

Those constraint payments are a drop in the ocean with 14GW installed capacity, and are only required when you get a co-incidence of demand at absolute minimum and high wind output, as you increase capacity they will increase exponentially and not linearly.

On nuclear, it's the same problem, with large amounts of both installed you're going to be paying for either one or the other to stand idle for lots of time, and to repeat, the cost of that is going to increase exponentially as capacity is expanded.


Edit:

Wind, 1.05GW at the moment, just over 3% of demand.
 
Those constraint payments are a drop in the ocean with 14GW installed capacity, and are only required when you get a co-incidence of demand at absolute minimum and high wind output, as you increase capacity they will increase exponentially and not linearly.

On nuclear, it's the same problem, with large amounts of both installed you're going to be paying for either one or the other to stand idle for lots of time, and to repeat, the cost of that is going to increase exponentially as capacity is expanded.


Edit:

Wind, 1.05GW at the moment, just over 3% of demand.
Except by then battery storage will be in play. This is a short term problem.

There is a flood of investment into renewable energy, and they are smarter than you and I and investment firms are putting billions of pounds, dollars and euros into this. They are well aware of economic models, and will figure out how to adapt. This is a trivial concern that is mostly swatted away from these companies. Nobody is seriously worried about prices going to zero for over productuon. You are vastly underestimating how electricy demand is due to skyrocket as we electrify every new vehicle on the road and get rid of gas boilers.

Similarly, net zero plans are already in place to make sure the grid is flexible. We won't have to rely on natural gas to top up when it's still, or not sunny. Storage at the point of production and point of consumption is already under development. Smart meters and appliances will reduce demand at lower production moments, interconnectors will take surplus energy from other countries when we need it. We import natural gas when we need it, who is to say we can't import more renewables as we already do? More pumped storage projects may be built too which will help.

You have identified problems that are already being solved and declaring that renewables can't work. Well just sit back and watch as money and infrastructure floods in, because the market is telling you that you are wrong, and very smart people are working around the clock to figure out solutions to these problems, just like in any emerging industry. Merchant projects are increasing, the days of subsidised renewables is coming to an end. Companies aren't investing billions into solar and wind with the expectation they will stay at 20% of our supply. They expect it to rise. To 30%. Then 50%. Then 100%. I promise you, you haven't spotted something they don't already have plans for. Business is booming.

Edit - solar now providing 20% of our energy.
 
Except by then battery storage will be in play. This is a short term problem.


Similarly, net zero plans are already in place to make sure the grid is flexible. We won't have to rely on natural gas to top up when it's still, or not sunny. Storage at the point of production and point of consumption is already under development. Smart meters and appliances will reduce demand at lower production moments, interconnectors will take surplus energy from other countries when we need it. We import natural gas when we need it, who is to say we can't import more renewables as we already do? More pumped storage projects may be built too which will help.

Your whole case relies upon the hope that we'll somehow develop the means to store electricity on a vast scale, we're nowhere near that so far, and I suspect we're already reaching the upper limits of battery technology. I think this is a lot further off than you do.

One other point, there's nothing to say you can't store nuclear generated electricity either.


There is a flood of investment into renewable energy, and they are smarter than you and I and investment firms are putting billions of pounds, dollars and euros into this. They are well aware of economic models, and will figure out how to adapt. This is a trivial concern that is mostly swatted away from these companies. Nobody is seriously worried about prices going to zero for over productuon. You are vastly underestimating how electricy demand is due to skyrocket as we electrify every new vehicle on the road and get rid of gas boilers.

You have identified problems that are already being solved and declaring that renewables can't work. Well just sit back and watch as money and infrastructure floods in, because the market is telling you that you are wrong, and very smart people are working around the clock to figure out solutions to these problems, just like in any emerging industry. Merchant projects are increasing, the days of subsidised renewables is coming to an end. Companies aren't investing billions into solar and wind with the expectation they will stay at 20% of our supply. They expect it to rise. To 30%. Then 50%. Then 100%. I promise you, you haven't spotted something they don't already have plans for. Business is booming.

Is that investment all based on fixed price contracts? If so, then the whole thing relies upon government guarantees and spending and the market is telling you nothing at all.


Edit - solar now providing 20% of our energy.

Yep, nice sunny day, it'll drop off to about half of that by around 17:00 (when peak demand starts) and to effectively zero by 20:00 before starting again at about 08:00 tomorrow.

Over the past day, wind/solar has managed to meet 13.7% of demand, 67% came from fossil fuels, and we've even had to fire up some of the remaining coal plants as well.

Interestingly, to correct a point you raised earlier, there's not a great deal of variation in demand at this time of year, the minimum yesterday was just under 25GW, and the max just over 31GW
 
Not easily, either the intermediary companies go bust, or the gas generators stop producing because the gas they use costs more than they can sell the electricity for (at which point they go bust), about the only thing the government can do is super-tax the renewables generators and re-distribute the profits, but that's only ever going to have a marginal effect.

Unfortunately, the reality of "net-zero" and the rush for renewables has left us excessively reliant on gas and intermittent supplies such as wind rather than a more balanced and secure mix of gas/nuclear/coal, which means when the wind doesn't blow and the price of gas goes through the roof we're left in a situation like this.

I wonder how quickly we could build a coal power station, or convert some of our existing gas stations to burn the same.
We don't have any coal mines. They'll take longer to develop than build a power station.
 
When I was a lad, and that’s a long, long time ago, I don’t remember ever being really cold. No central heating, just coal fires which due to chimney design, warmed the whole house. Yes when you went to bed it was cold at first and yes you wore a jumper, but it was ok. Of course the issue is carbon emissions, but surely with modern technology that can be mitigated
I was skinny. So i was freezing.
 
We aren't 'maxed out' on wind production, by building more farms we can spread out across more varied areas in the UK and get better coverage. The south coast, for example, barely has any onshore wind farms, and it is currently windier there. But volatility is obviously a massive issue of course, I completely accept that. But we haven't mentioned solar yet, which tends to rise as wind declines, as we are obviously in the summer. 23% of our energy today (live) is coming from solar. 10% from wind. So our renewable power hasn't declined, that's in line with the yearly average (just solar and wind have swapped places). We should have more tidal power, which the UK is uniquely suited for, but is largely ignored. We should have more nuclear. These are failures.

The issue I have here is trying to blame 'net zero' and advocating for a return to the absolutely distrous use of coal. Coal decline in the UK was already well underway before climate change was even widely accepted, and decades before net zero was a thing. Natural gas was cheaper, and its rise in the 90s is directly correlated to steep declines in coal. It's not renewables that cannabalized the coal market, it was gas. Granted, the complete closure of coal since 2015 has been accelerated by government policy in aid of net zero, but this was really the last few percent of an already dying industry.
The closure of coal was acceleratedby a Tory policy of killing off the enemy within. Politics quickened the rush from Bitish coal, hence our huge importing of the stuff.
 
Your whole case relies upon the hope that we'll somehow develop the means to store electricity on a vast scale, we're nowhere near that so far, and I suspect we're already reaching the upper limits of battery technology. I think this is a lot further off than you do.

One other point, there's nothing to say you can't store nuclear generated electricity either.




Is that investment all based on fixed price contracts? If so, then the whole thing relies upon government guarantees and spending and the market is telling you nothing at all.




Yep, nice sunny day, it'll drop off to about half of that by around 17:00 (when peak demand starts) and to effectively zero by 20:00 before starting again at about 08:00 tomorrow.

Over the past day, wind/solar has managed to meet 13.7% of demand, 67% came from fossil fuels, and we've even had to fire up some of the remaining coal plants as well.

Interestingly, to correct a point you raised earlier, there's not a great deal of variation in demand at this time of year, the minimum yesterday was just under 25GW, and the max just over 31GW
We're already near the capacity of batteries? That's just absolute nosnense. Completely ridiculous. Time will very quickly prove you wrong here. There are plenty of minerals around the world, plenty of factories still to be built, and much growing political willpower. Production is getting cheaper and storage cost has almost halved. Investment and actual production is growing exponentially. You don't even need big huge batteries if every home and office has one which they can store locally.

It's also not the case that the whole thing relies on batteries, if you didn't ignore all the other solutions. We are decarbonising everything. Buildings. Concrete production. Transport fleets. Cars. Agriculture. Carbon capture technology, while possibly not scalable to the point we would like it, is going online, and will also require more electricity. Lack of demand overall to the point companies don't see an economic value in existing, is just not realistic. We've not even talked about green hydrogen! Using excess production to shift from grey to blue to green as costs continue to get cheaper is also a possibility.

On Nuclear, I'm fine to have nuclear or to be 100% renewable. Current UK net zero planning is from 100% renewable, but I suspect that could change to incorporate nuclear too.

Another solution you have ignored is just being more efficient. Storage in charging electric vehicles and an entire transport industry of trucks and ships at cheaper price times. Smart appliances that will mimic this behaviour. More smart meters. You could just build more pumped storage resoviours to save for times of lower production. We could even continue with curtailment where electricity is just dumped and governments pay for that. Renewables are super cheap and getting cheaper. The cost of building renewable sites is cheaper than operating existing fossil fuel plants. We will have spare budget to off-set some of this.

All of these are being planned and more. Governments have committed to net zero. There will always be support especially from a pretty business friendly country like the UK. Once again, I will go with the actions of this industry which is flooding in new projects and investment rather than 'it won't work because of this one problem which people are already solving'. What kind of attitude is that? Industries deal with over production all the time. Farming, for example. This is not beyond human comprehension.
 
The closure of coal was acceleratedby a Tory policy of killing off the enemy within. Politics quickened the rush from Bitish coal, hence our huge importing of the stuff.
We import less than we produce, and we barely produce anything. We don't import much coal at all, it's a tiny amount
 
When you think about the average wages around here, probably most on less than £20k, they will be seriously in fuel poverty, which is said to be if your energy bills are over 10% of your income. January bills are forecast to be over £4,000, so if you apply that to net wages after tax and Ni, your looking at 20%. The government has to do something.
 
We import less than we produce, and we barely produce anything. We don't import much coal at all, it's a tiny amount
Prior to the Ukraine war - hence, sanctions - coal production in the UK was just 4.5 million tonnes (2020). This was down 27% from the previous year and 91% down from when production was at its peak. In 2021 coal imports amounted to 4.6 million tonnes, being 48% of supply. 27% of the imported coal came from Russia.
 
Prior to the Ukraine war - hence, sanctions - coal production in the UK was just 4.5 million tonnes (2020). This was down 27% from the previous year and 91% down from when production was at its peak. In 2021 coal imports amounted to 4.6 million tonnes, being 48% of supply. 27% of the imported coal came from Russia.
Exactly, this is proving my point. Imports are less than half of our supply, the rest is new production and reserves. And 4.6m tonnes of imports is nothing. Buttons. 0.5% of our energy in 2021
 
Exactly, this is proving my point. Imports are less than half of our supply, the rest is new production and reserves. And 4.6m tonnes of imports is nothing. Buttons. 0.5% of our energy in 2021
Heritage steam railways are wondering where to get their coal from. A bit ridiculous when the country is still standing on billions of tons of the stuff.
 
Exactly, this is proving my point. Imports are less than half of our supply, the rest is new production and reserves. And 4.6m tonnes of imports is nothing. Buttons. 0.5% of our energy in 2021
It proves your point once you've thought of a different base comparator to use. 😁 In fact, it proves nothing of the sort.

The UK could easily produce its full requirements. The facts are against it however - environmental facts. Instead of importing coal the UK should be looking to cover the energy shortfall that would create by focussing far more on green energy than it has hitherto.
 
It proves your point once you've thought of a different base comparator. In fact, it proves nothing of the sort.

The UK could easily produce its full requirements. The facts are against it however - environmental facts. Instead of importing coal the UK should be looking to cover the energy shortfall that would create by focussing far more on green energy than it has hitherto.
My point was we aren't importing huge amounts of the stuff. And that's true. If it's 0.5% or so of our energy supply, that's not a huge amount. Your post seemed to imply that by closing coal production we have just brought it all in via imports which just isn't really the case. It will all be zero by 2024.
 
Back
Top