3 hours ago, Beelbeebub said:

BBC News

UK government approves Jackdaw gas field, and says produc...

The government says the approval will "heat millions of homes and protect hundreds of jobs". Green Party leader Zack Polanski calls it "climate vandalism".

Government have finally come down off the fence.

Personally I think it sends the wrong signals internationally but, as has been repeated, this will make little difference to prices, jobs or energy security.

The plus side is that the government have indicated the revenues from this will be funneled to a fund to help the transition to renewables and it does end the crap from certain politicians on the right about lowering energy bills.

I can imagine how unpleased you were this morning....................

Let us see how much this changes in the next few months.

3 hours ago, Spinny said:

I still think there is madness here. All renewables has given us so far is higher energy prices and the lurking threat of power cuts.

Renewables provided about 2x the amount that has did this summer and will probably do so through the winter albeit more from wind and less from solar.

Given the price of the gas that fuels the power stations has jumped from around 75p per therm this time last year to over 210p per therm now renewables have had a definite impact on reducing our electricity prices.

And given how low our gas storage is (a few days worth - though it will take a couple of weeks to extract it) we are just one Russian sabotage mission away from our gas power plants having to shut down and have rolling blackouts.

It is absolute madness to think that relying on a substance we have to import for our electricity (and heating) is better than moving to a system where we can produce the majority of our electricity and heating and (ultimately) transport in the UK and only use small amounts (which we may be able to source from our own reserves if we don't piss them away first) of gas as occasional backup.

35 minutes ago, SteamyTea said:

Let us see how much this changes in the next few months.

We'll all be roughnecks,working on the rigs soon.

58 minutes ago, Roger440 said:

I can imagine how unpleased you were this morning....................

You don't have to imagine.

I was slightly disappointed but not surprised.

I think it is the wrong decision but I can understand what it was taken.

There will be negligible benefit to energy prices, energy security or jobs.

On the other hand the CO2 effect will also be pretty negligible.

And if (big if) the tax revenues are ploughed back towards transition - that will be good.

And not having to listen to idiots claiming that bills would fall and we would be energy secure if only the government allowed drilling will be an absolute godsend. Possibly the biggest benefit of the whole thing.

Meanwhile the country still needs to up the pace on the energy transition with policies like

• Reducing energy consumption

• Electrification of heat and transport

• Building out renewable capacity

• Upgrading the grid

• Increasing energy storage (including of gas)

• Even building more CCGT plants as backup.

All of the "net zero" policies (plus a few others)

6 hours ago, Spinny said:

I still think there is madness here. All renewables has given us so far is higher energy prices and the lurking threat of power cuts.

https://www.carbonbrief.org/revealed-expensive-gas-behind-nearly-90-of-rise-in-uk-electricity-bills

And to look at the 2nd biggest chunk of the increase - network costs....

"According to the Energy Networks Association, up to 80% of the investment in electricity grids is required to maintain existing assets, with the remainder going towards expansion for net-zero."

A reminder that the backbone of the grid has a design life of around 60 and was built in the 60's.

And also

"Notably, household electricity prices have increased far less rapidly since the Hormuz crisis than gas bills, with higher clean-energy generation helping break the link between the two."

Not sure using 2020 as a baseline is really helpful when talking about the cost of renewables. Go back to 2010 and the answer may be somewhat different. Though this does highlight that while there may have been past costs due to renewable policies the recent impacts are limited.

It is still the case though that we have relatively high and structurally high prices. Really any discussion about prices should be holistic. I continue to believe that there are likely cheaper ways to achieve the same result

50 minutes ago, -rick- said:

Not sure using 2020 as a baseline is really helpful when talking about the cost of renewables. Go back to 2010 and the answer may be somewhat different. Though this does highlight that while there may have been past costs due to renewable policies the recent impacts are limited.

It is still the case though that we have relatively high and structurally high prices. Really any discussion about prices should be holistic. I continue to believe that there are likely cheaper ways to achieve the same result

A reasonable point.

The growth in renewables since 2010 has been pretty remarkable

2010 less than 5%

2015 about 25%

2020 about 40%

2025 about 50%

2015 was when the carbon emissions from our grid really started dropping.

Back then UK gas was about 35p a therm.

So the rise in wholesale prices over that period is even more - so presumably the rise in electricity prices attributable to gas prices would be similarly steep.

I think the core point is that the majority of the rise in electricity prices is down to the rise in gas prices rather than "net zero"