Pledge to make european system carbon neutral
The European electricity generating industry is currently the beneficiary of what Point Carbon, the research group, has identified as a stupefying £56bn windfall.
Where has all this money come from? It is arriving simply because to date the generators have received all of their permits to pollute under the European emissions trading scheme absolutely free and gratis. And then factored into their prices the official trading price of the permits – as Dorothy Thompson, the boss of the UK's biggest generating-only company, Drax, unguardedly admitted in an obscure media interview.
To counter the criticism, the industry's trade body Eurelectric is planning a big announcement this autumn. It will pledge that the entire European electricity system will become completely carbon neutral. All very welcome of course, and guaranteed to bring the power boys lots of unusually positive publicity. Even if effectively we are talking two generations of power stations from now.
Because what will be stated rather more quietly is that this pledge will not be realised until 2050. Getting from the carbon filled present to the promised Nirvana 40+ years on, will mean a big change from the status quo. There are at present plans to build at least a dozen massive new coal fired power stations like Eon's controversial Kingsnorth, all over Europe.
It would help Eurelectric's credibility if at this stage the industry would at least make provision for these new carbon-guzzlers to be ‘carbon capture and sequestration' ready. Even if the technology in question is still untried, and unlikely to be around for at least a dozen years – if we are lucky.
Of course by 2050 all of today's electric company bosses will be long since off on their retirement yachts. These will of course naturally be solar powered.
A minor detail
Was I alone in finding it ironic it was some of British Energy's private shareholders, like M&G, who rejected Electricite de France's initial bid to run the UK's existing nuclear power station? This thwarted the Labour Party, after 11 years of government, being able at last to respond to the demands of its' principal funders, the trade unions.
Because, after the nationalisation of Northern Rock, some nostalgic trade unionists are beginning to smell blood in the electricity sector, folowing its outrageous price increases. Bring it back into public ownership, they argue.
Electricite de France – which opts to trade in the UK as the much more language neutral EDF – is also known to be circling around Iberduero of Spain. Contemplating a wholesale take-over. If they succeed, that will mean Scottish Power (an Iberduero subsidiary) joining its vast empire, which includes such erstwhile famous – but now forgotten – names as Seeboard, London Electricity and SWEB. As well as British Energy.
All this is very pleasing to these 1970s-style trade unionists. After all, EDF is still to all intents and purposes a wholly owned subsidiary of government. The fact the government in question resides in Paris rather than London is surely but a minor detail.
Brave new atomic world
The repercussions from the recent contretemps in the Caucasus rumble on. One of the main reasons why the USA is so concerned about little Georgia – which for centuries was very much part of Russia – is the two oil and gas pipelines which have recently been built below ground, to carry these fossil fuels from the Caspian Sea to the West. During the days of Russian bombardment of Georgia, it was instructive to note how much of it was targeted on these pipelines.
Why? Because they exist to offer the West an alternative source for these hydrocarbons, rather than Mother Russia. Many of the more easterly countries in Europe have grown heavily dependent upon Gazprom, and desperately need to diversify. Hence also the horror with which the news of faults in the Norwegian gas pipelines are restricting supplies for this winter.
Next month the French presidency is ensuring the European Union debates a new policy paper, to emerge from the European Commission, on energy security. As far as President Sarkozy is concerned, there is one obvious response to these concerns. And that is for more European countries to follow the example of the Finns. Reject Russian gas. Build more nuclear power plants. And just guess which is the only country will can offer the expertise to deliver this brave new atomic world? Why, you can hear the laughter all the way from Paris.
Credit where it is due
In my August column, I told the happy story about how the arrival of integrated digital tuners upon the market place had reduced the anticipated growth of electricity consumption from the television market. Their success is knocking set-top boxes off the market. And thus reduces the previously anticipated growth in terawatt hour (TWh) consumption from the television sector by an impressive 40%.
I had used this as an example as to how the arrival of a new electricity consuming technology could – contrary to received opinion about gadgets – actually reduce demand. A triumph for the marketplace , I opined. Not so, say the regulators Ofgem. Apparently this only happened because of its specific intervention.
It oversees the Energy Efficiency Commitment scheme. Between 2005 and 2008, this forced the Big Six energy companies to stimulate some 151 TWh of savings in homes. One way the companies were encouraged to achieve this was by Ofgem providing direct incentives to install certain technologies. One of these was integrated digital tuners.
Hence the market transformation. It was obviously Ofgem's masterful insight which achieved this remarkable feat. I am always glad to give credit where credit is due.
