Politicians Need to Think of Long-Term Consequences When It Comes to Energy

We’ve been saying for years that the fact that a coherent energy policy requires long term thinking means that it cannot be left in the hands of politicians with short term thinking, or at least until the next election.

This piece in the FT lays bare the problems which come when government tinker with things without a thought for the long term consequences. UK energy policy has left the margin of safety for our generation capacity wafer thin, and with a heightened risk of blackouts. This grim picture, painted by the CCO of Scottish Power, Keith Anderson, might be dismissed as yet another energy company pitching for more subsidy and handouts.  Secretary of State Amber Rudd was certainly very quick to slap down such talk over the weekend.

We’ll find out who is right soon enough, but the thrust of this article is interesting. One, it finally acknowledges the huge competitive advantage that wind and solar have over conventional generators, in that once the installation is up and running, the ongoing costs of generation are almost nil. No fuel to import, no expensive emissions compliance and only very little maintenance and solar panel cleaning. So it’s baffling that the paper calls for more subsidy for back up gas generation when in fact, it would be more sensible to subsidise storage of wind and solar energy which is currently sent into the grid.

It’ll happen without subsidy anyway, the market will take care of that, but in the time that it takes we may end up throwing more billions at white elephant gas generating plants which will be obsolete in a few years.

You can read the full article here...

and you can contact us to talk about how you can protect your business by generating and using your own electricity here.