Letter: Looking to the future
What are we really subsidising? On Radio 4’s Any Questions, held in Shrewsbury, Nigel Farage peddled the UKIP line that the UK is over-subsidising wind power.
In the year to April last year, £0.7bn was given to offshore and onshore wind power, compared with £7bn paid by the UK taxpayer to the nuclear industry, mainly going on decommissioning power stations and managing dangerous toxic waste.
Per kW of energy produced, renewables do indeed receive a slightly higher subsidy than fossil fuels, but this does not reflect the fact that renewable costs will fall as the technology matures, whereas fossil fuels are set to increase in price; nor does it include fossil energy’s huge cost in terms of pollution and public health.
Steve Parker, Shropshire Green Party, Shrewsbury
Comments for: "Letter: Looking to the future"
R Suppards
I assume that Steve Parker has a plan for keeping his lights on after several days of flat calm? Wind power is not the answer (nor is solar). Tidal or wave power is both predictable and continuous, wind power is neither. Nuclear is the answer. We must have it - and it must be safe. However, advances in fusion technology may succeed and make all other methods obsolete.
The Original Jake
One of the problems with nuclear fission is that there are no fuel sources in the UK. Nuclear effectively hands control of our long-term energy needs to other countries.
Roger
Fusing two parts of hydrogen with one pat of oxygen produces water with energy released. I agree that the fuel is expensive if you use current materials but the idea is to take the technology further to abundant sources of energy. Well away in real terms but is surely the long term future. I agree that that the real problem is the dependance on imports which threatens our economy and price stability. Home produced is best.
The Original Jake
You're describing fusion, which is the holy grail and is still out of reach for now, as you say. (Your description is slightly wrong; fusion needs deuterium and tritium isotopes of hydrogen, which fuse to create helium + neutrons. Water is the raw material - and we have plenty of that!)
For fission, uranium is required (possibly thorium as an alternative).
Currently it seems our nuclear power needs are provided by the French and, with today's announcement re. Hitachi, the Japanese. The largest Uranium producer is Kazakhstan.
green guru
suppards its easy to keep the lights on when theres no wind in shropshire there is wind in other parts of the uk or indeed in eu with the supergrid now, its like how you can have tomatoes all year round when they only grow in the summer in the Uk
you can have a national grid taking power from numerous inputs and matching supply and demand
further more you can back up into things call dams which release water / energy in time of demand through hydro electric
Watchdog
Correct, however, we are sleepwalking into an energy crisis that could result in regular blackouts around the country - and pity the government that finds itself in power when Joe Public can't watch Coronation Street and crime soars as enterprising rogues take advantage of our return to the night time conditions of earlier centuries. This is one area where the Green Party is pitifully out of touch with reality.
Andrew finch
Nothing wrong with lights off at midnight , we are over paying for wannabe police officers in pcso make them work a night shift and walk the towns streets with a torch no excuses for not implementing such a request.
Roger
Let’s start with the basic truth. There are no subsidies. We pay for it all in our fuel bills. The "subsidies" are covered by a levy charged in our fuel bills.
All energy costs are a combination of the cost of extracting the energy from the earth and transporting it to the point of use. Gas and oil are free, the cost is extracting them transporting them and profiteering on the process to a point where they are burnt in a power station to put electricity on the grid or burnt in our boilers.
Wind and water have to be converted to electricity in a more expensive process requiring higher capital costs and then connected to the grid. The cost of manufacturing and installing the equipment is in it's self a carbon producing process.
Nuclear is just the same, fuel costs nothing, it's the process of delivery and capital cost of plant to convert it to electricity on the grid.
The simplest way of comparing the costs is by their price which is affected by taxation here and abroad and the futures market but money is the best way of measuring the environmental cost. We should also consider the balance of payments because if we earn no money abroad we can't buy from abroad.
Because of environmental issues we now need to add to the costs, the affects on the environment in carbon emissions noise nuclear pollution etc. and reversing them.
Coal is the cheapest but rising due the cost or carbon capture
Gas is second but rising due to the cost of carbon capture
Oil is next rising for carbon capture.
Nuclear comes next and has already had its environmental issues accounted for
Then wind which is all capital costs
Finally water split two ways, hydroelectric which is cheap but limited by suitable sites and wave power which is ridiculously expensive in capital costs.
What we actually need is the most sustainable sources of energy that we can afford. We need to have it based on foreign sources being avoided as we do not have foreign earning to pay for it.
The existing sources of gas and oil from the North Sea can continue to be used with carbon capture as long as they last before the equation changes based of affordability of imports. The existing coal plants are now all worn out. The existing nuclear plants are all life expired. There has been under investment in generation that has now created an energy gap which must be filled so which way to go.
The best source is nuclear because the technology is cheapest and proved with low basic fuel cost.
The second best is home produced coal with carbon capture.
Then wind and water.
In all cases; it is the capital employed that is the problem and the historic lack of investment since privatisation. We have to pay for the capital through our bills via the levy. We need all forms of home produced energy to provide diversity of supply and control of supply to match demand. It is our ability to store energy produced and to release on demand that will in the end control the costs because all of the power generators are best when operating at full output.
Coal with carbon capture is actually the cheapest option but that would mean restarting the mining industry and that means even more capital investment so gets relegated below nuclear.
France had to face this dilemma years ago because of the lack of domestically produced oil and gas and they are now predominantly nuclear. We can learn lessons from others.
green guru
Its worth reminding people that the subsidy for UK Wind doesnt cost the taxpayer a penny actually, its all on electricity bills for businesses and homes, but not on the general tax unlike the subsidies for oil, waste to energy and nuclear as highlighted which are larger and do add to your actual tax bill.
John
"unlike the subsidies for oil"
Do me a favour! 30 yrs ago the 6-months cheque to the government from 1 oil company for Petroleum Revenue Tax was over £5 billion, the Collector of Taxes at the Inland Revenue used to take it straight to the Bank of England to ensure it was banked the same day.
And by the way lots of us are both taxpayers and energy consumers and wind subsidies are costing us all lots of pounds not pennies, and will be for years to come.
Katherine de Gama
Well said, Steve.