UK Energy

In an unusual move, the Energy Secretary – a committed opponent of oil and gas – has told regulators not to approve a new round of drilling that was slated for confirmation in the coming weeks.

It means companies have potentially wasted millions on preparing their bids, with experts warning legal action is likely.

The decision follows crisis meetings held this week between Miliband and his aides after questions were asked by journalists about outstanding drilling applications.

Applications were submitted by 76 oil and gas companies as part of the 33rd offshore oil and gas licensing round initiated by the last government in autumn 2023.

Bids for up to 35 areas of the North Sea were still awaiting a decision from the North Sea Transition Authority (NSTA) when the election was called.

In a statement late on Wednesday, Miliband's spokesman said: “We will not issue new licences to explore new fields, and will not revoke existing oil and gas licences. We will manage existing fields for the entirety of their lifespan.”

Labour has appointed one of the country’s foremost climate experts to lead a “mission control centre” on clean energy.

Chris Stark, the former head of the UK’s climate watchdog, will head a Covid vaccine-style taskforce aimed at delivering clean and cheaper power by 2030.

The Department for Energy Security and Net Zero said the centre would work with energy companies and regulators and would be the first of its kind in Whitehall, following Keir Starmer’s plan for mission-driven government.

According to this model, ministers will focus on tackling five of the biggest challenges facing the country, one of which is clean energy.

Stark said: “Tackling the climate crisis and accelerating the transition to clean power is the country’s biggest challenge, and its greatest opportunity. By taking action now, we can put the UK at the forefront of the global race to net zero.”

Campaigners have warned that building England’s largest onshore wind farm on protected peatland would be “catastrophic for carbon storage, wildlife and flood risk”. Saudi-backed developer World Wide Renewable Energy Global Ltd wants to construct the farm on more than 2,300 hectares at Walshaw Moor, between Hebden Bridge and Haworth.

Consisting of up to 65 wind turbines, it would be capable of generating up to 302MW of energy.

The developer said last September that it would establish a £75m community benefit fund and also pledged to end grouse shooting if it was granted planning permission.

However, campaigners say it would impact endangered birds, like curlew, lapwing, skylark and merlin, and exacerbate already serious local flooding.

The huge development would need 22 miles of access roads and 160 tonnes of reinforced concrete for each of the gigantic turbines.

At 200m tall (655ft), the turbines would be 20m higher than London’s 41-storey Gherkin building.

Campaigners say turbine construction and the associated infrastructure will affect hydrology, causing peatlands to dry out to such an extent that they will become a net emitter of carbon rather than a carbon sink.

Plans for a £200m green energy park, which could create 4,500 jobs, have been given the green light.

Yorkshire Energy Park, on the site of the former Hedon Aerodrome, to the east of Hull, is set to focus on renewable energy, battery storage, state-of-the-art digital infrastructure and research and development. The proposal, for land allocated to the wider Humber Freeport scheme, was approved by Hull City Council's ruling cabinet.

Households are set to learn that their energy bills will rise again from January as hopes for relief from the cost-of-living crisis are put on hold.

Ofgem will announce its latest price cap on Thursday, with energy consultancy Cornwall Insight predicting it will increase from the current £1,834 for a typical dual fuel household to £1,931 – a 5% jump to take effect from January to March.

The forecasts suggest that the typical bill will then fall to £1,853 from the start of April, but will not drop below today’s level until July next year.

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Dr Craig Lowrey, principal consultant at Cornwall Insight, said: “An unstable wholesale energy market, coupled with the UK’s reliance on energy imports, makes it inevitable that energy bills will rise from current levels.

“This leaves households facing yet another winter with bills hundreds of pounds higher than pre-pandemic levels, and affordable fixed deals few and far between.”

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“While we continue to advocate for immediate targeted support for vulnerable consumers, it is evident that the only enduring solution lies in transitioning the UK away from the influence of global energy prices towards sustainable, domestically sourced energy.”

Other countries are using the UK as an excuse for pressing ahead with fossil fuel projects despite their climate commitments, according to Adair Turner, the first chair of the Committee on Climate Change and a former head of the CBI.

Lord Turner told the Guardian that he had “literally been involved in discussions” in China and India where UK decisions had been given as a reason for not moving faster on the climate.

“I can tell you that [the Cumbrian coalmine] was a disaster globally, and in China and India, where I was engaged in debates [on reducing greenhouse gas emissions], I have had people say ‘yeah, but you’re building a new coalmine in the UK’,” he said.

“So that was a disaster for our reputation, and it provides arguments for the people within government or within interest groups in China and India to say ‘oh look, the UK is supposedly committed to net zero, but it’s not serious, it’s building a new coalmine’. And the same occurs with new oil and gas fields in the North Sea.”

Turner is now chair of the Energy Transitions Commission (ETC), a thinktank that on Thursday published a report that says the production of and demand for fossil fuels must be reduced rapidly, and that this is achievable. “Unabated” fossil fuel use must be phased out, and there is only limited scope for the use of carbon capture and storage (CCS), the report finds.

Automated floating factories that manufacture green versions of petrol or diesel could soon be in operation thanks to pioneering work at the University of Cambridge. The revolutionary system would produce a net-zero fuel that would burn without creating fossil-derived emissions of carbon dioxide, say researchers.

The Cambridge project is based on a floating artificial leaf which has been developed at the university and which can turn sunlight, water and carbon dioxide into synthetic fuel. The group believe these thin, flexible devices could one day be exploited on a industrial scale.

“Solar panels are excellent at generating electricity and are making a great contribution to the world reaching its net zero aspirations,” said Erwin Reisner, the professor of energy and sustainability at Cambridge University. “But using sunlight to make non-fossil fuels that could be burned by cars or ships takes things a stage further.”

Reisner and his colleagues envisage exploiting the technology to build carpets of artificial leaves that would float on lakes and river estuaries, and use sunlight to convert water and carbon dioxide into the components of petrol and other fuels. “The crucial point is that we are not decarbonising the economy through techniques like these,” Reisner said. “Carbon is still a key component. What we are doing is to ‘defossilise’ the economy. We will no longer be burning ancient sources of carbon – coal, oil and gas – and adding greenhouse gases to the atmosphere, a process that is doing so much damage at present.”

cross-posted from: https://derp.foo/post/374476

Wind conclusions:

The authors give three reasons for their discrepancy with MacKay’s estimates.

• Improved fixed turbine technologies. MacKay described all waters deeper than 30 metres as “not economically feasible”. But fixed turbines could soon be commercially feasible to around 80 metres of depth.

• Floating offshore turbines. The advent of floating turbines means that these can extend into much deeper waters. Note that O’Callaghan et al. (2023) already account for many other competing uses such as fishing areas, military zones, shipping routes, and low-wind areas.

• Improved social and political support. O’Callaghan et al. (2023) assume there is less public resistance to offshore wind, which seems appropriate.

Solar conclusions:

What are the major differences to MacKay?

• Lower cost: the price of solar PV has fallen by 90% in the last decade. MacKay’s main concern was it was too expensive: this is not the case today.

• Improved cell efficiency: MacKay used a cell efficiency of 10%, and thought an efficiency of 30% would be “quite remarkable”. Last year, Fraunhofer ISE achieved 47.6%. Efficiencies greater than 30% have also been achieved using perovskite solar cells. O’Callaghan uses a cell efficiency of 25%. See the footnote for a chart showing the differences in efficiency over time.7

• Combined use with agriculture: MacKay assumed an inherent trade-off between agricultural land and solar. He thought the Brits would never give up farmland for solar panels. But this trade-off does not always exist: there are now a range of projects where solar and agriculture work in tandem (‘agrivoltaics’).

The well was drilled but never fracked - leaving the site owners, Third Energy, with a deep hole in the ground.

Tom Heap with Steve Mason and Russell Hoare at the once highly-contested proposed fracking site Its managing director, Russell Hoare, showed me the well and explained its second life. They are even re-using the two metre-high gas valve which caps the hole.

"This is the actual well that was drilled for fracking and it's about 3,000 metres deep, but the protesters were successful, and Steve was successful, in stopping that operation.

"But it's perfect for testing geothermal energy. There's hot water at the bottom. All we're doing is bringing it to the surface."

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Once commercially exploited, they reckon this well could supply 300 homes, so we would need a lot more deep drilling to keep Britain warm.

Gas to geothermal conversion company, CeraPhi, thinks there are 680 wells in the UK ripe for conversion together with millions around the world, and that new wells can be sunk cheaply enough to expand further.

Such potential provokes interest. While we are on the site, chief executive Karl Farrow is showing around a group of academics and industry players.

They've had more than 100 such visitors in the past month.

Karl told me: "Wells at the end of life can be repurposed and reused for energy.

cross-posted from: https://feddit.uk/post/3446966

And you can have your say via public consultation starting today

An old coal mine has been providing an English town with green energy for the last six months.

The ground-breaking project in Gateshead is using the warm water that has filled the tunnels to heat hundreds of homes and businesses in the former coalfield community.

Hailed a success, the UK’s first large-scale network shows the huge potential to be found in the nation’s sprawling warren of old mining tunnels, which sit beneath roughly a quarter of homes.

The world's largest offshore wind farm has started producing electricity for the first time.

Power from the first turbine at the Dogger Bank project, which is construction in the North Sea, is now being sent to the UK's national grid.

In total 277 turbines will be powered-up at the location, situated between 81 and 124 miles (130-200km) off the Yorkshire coast.

The wind farm is due for completion in 2026.

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Each rotation of the 107m (351ft) long blades on Dogger Bank's first operational turbine can produce enough clean energy to power an average British home for two days, SSE Renewables said.

Once complete, Dogger Bank's offshore turbines are expected to generate 3.6GW of power - enough for six million UK homes.

Rishi Sunak plans to restrict the installation of solar panels on swathes of English farmland, which climate campaigners say will raise bills and put the UK’s energy security at risk.

Last year, then prime minister Liz Truss attempted to block solar from most of the country’s farmland. The plans were deeply controversial and unpopular, and were dropped when she left office.

However, solar panels in the countryside are disliked by many rural Conservative MPs, and the Observer can reveal that Sunak and environment secretary Thérèse Coffey have revived plans to put new restrictions on this form of cheap renewable energy.

Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) at Mildenhall Industrial Park in West Suffolk have reported reductions in their energy bills, ranging from 20% to as much as 90%, thanks to a peer-to-peer energy trading initiative.

West Suffolk Council and Manchester-based deeptech company UrbanChain have partnered to establish a local green energy market.

Peer-to-peer energy trading enables individuals and businesses to directly buy and sell electricity.

West Suffolk Council has proactively invested in renewable energy infrastructure, with 272kW of solar PV installations on ten commercial buildings within Mildenhall Industrial Estate and ownership of a nearby 12MW solar farm.

By participating in UrbanChain’s peer-to-peer energy exchange, the council’s renewable generators have seen returns at least 35% higher than prevailing market rates.

The consumption of electricity in the UK has reached its lowest levels since the second quarter of 2020, a period marked by the initial Covid-19 lockdown, which significantly curtailed energy demand.

According to government analysis, this decline in electricity consumption is evident across all sectors, with the domestic sector experiencing the most significant reduction, down by 7.7% to 20.4TWh.

This continued trend of decreased consumption aligns with the backdrop of increasing household expenses, including rising energy costs.

In addition, there has been a substantial decrease in the demand for natural gas, with a 13% during the second quarter of 2023 compared to the same period in 2022.

The total final consumption of gas also witnessed a decline of 7.5%, reflecting reduced gas demand across all sectors.

Among these sectors, the domestic sector saw the most substantial decline, down by 9.3% compared to the same period in the previous year.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/5912949

EDF, GE-Hitachi Nuclear Energy International LLC, Holtec Britain Limited, NuScale Power, Rolls Royce and Westinghouse Electric Company UK Limited have been chosen for the next stage of the process.

The Small Modular Reactor (SMR) competition is part of the government’s plan for up to a quarter of all UK electricity to come from nuclear power by 2050.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/5913604

To date, the UK has installed more than 14 GW of onshore wind power and has a pipeline of planned projects totaling 23 GW.

Cool to see the UK doing cool shit even though they left the EU.

if we’re to stand any chance of making that net-zero deadline, we need to be able to do all of this faster. Quite simply, green energy projects are taking far too long to clear the planning process. It takes two years to build an offshore wind farm, but ten years to get it from the drawing board and through planning; and half that for onshore.

The last big electricity transmission line built in Scotland, Beauly-Denny, took 15 years to get through permitting and construction. By those standards, we would reach 2045 before we know it, with nothing changed. The recent Onshore Wind Sector Deal signed between the Scottish Government and the industry sets out commitments to reduce planning determination timescales, which is very welcome.

What we now need from both the Scottish and UK governments is a commitment to speed up the planning process to one year for all new renewables as well as the grid infrastructure that connects them to the network. It’s no good building the low-carbon generation if you can’t move the power to where it’s needed.

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Dr Sam Gardner is ScottishPower’s head of climate change and sustainability

So add salt accordingly. However, it does look like the Tories are building themselves up to be the party of NIMBYs and climate change deniers.

A £20bn plan to bring solar and wind power from the Sahara to Britain via the world’s longest sub-sea cable has been declared a project of “national significance” by Claire Coutinho, the new energy secretary.

The designation will streamline the planning process for the scheme, whose backers claim it could bring enough electricity from Morocco to supply more than 7mn homes, or 8 per cent of Britain’s power needs.

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Under the plan, electricity from the Guelmim Oued Noun region of southern Morocco would be supplied via cables running 3,800km under the sea to the tiny North Devon village of Alverdiscott, where it would be connected to the national grid.

Lewis said the project would have generation capacity of 10.5 gigawatts, of which 7GW would come from solar and 3.5GW from wind. “The sun shines every day there and the wind blows every evening,” he added.

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Xlinks said it is seeking a contract for 25 years guaranteeing a price of £56-£64 per MWh in 2012 prices. That is equivalent to about £77-£87 per MWh in today’s prices and is lower than the current wholesale price of about £96 per MWh.

However, prices in Britain may well fall as more renewable power comes online. Before the recent energy crisis, prices were about £50 per MWh.

Xlinks is seeking a higher guaranteed price than that awarded to onshore wind and solar in the UK government’s latest auction round for contracts, of £52 per MWh and £47 per MWh respectively, in 2012 prices. The contract length sought is also a decade longer than the typical 15 years.

The UK has experienced a significant surge in rooftop solar power installations in 2023, surpassing the total installations for the entire year of 2022, according to data from MCS.

The figures show that a total of 138,336 solar photovoltaic installations have been registered since December, slightly exceeding the 137,926 recorded throughout the previous year.

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The current trajectory suggests that the UK may surpass the all-time installation record of 203,120, established during the peak of the Feed-in Tariffs regime in 2011.

Wind and solar can provide significantly more energy than the highest energy demand forecasts for 2050 and nearly ten times current electricity demand (299 TWh/year). The research shows up to 2,896 TWh a year could be generated by wind and solar, against the demand forecast of 1,500 TWh/year.

These estimates are intentionally conservative, accounting for common concerns around land use and the visibility of installations, say the authors.

‘This is a question of ambition rather than technical feasibility,’ insists lead author Dr Brian O’Callaghan. ‘The UK is already lagging in the global green race. Instead of hitting reverse, we should be turbocharging on renewables with US-style incentives and gearing up our grid for the surge that is already underway.’

There are two big tensions in how, and how quickly, the UK gets to net zero. One was the main focus of Rishi Sunak’s speech last week in which the phasing out of sales of new petrol and diesel vehicles was delayed and gas boilers got a semi-reprieve. But the other aspect, only briefly referenced, deserves more attention: it is the reform of planning rules to allow the UK to build new electricity infrastructure, including hated pylons, at twice the pace we usually manage.

For a prime minister who says “consent” is “the only realistic path to net zero”, there is potential for more trouble. Net zero involves doubling the UK’s use of electricity, which plainly requires more kit, but not everybody wants to live near a new high-voltage transmission line suspended on 50-metre stilts. It is hard to see how the government’s target of decarbonising the power network by 2035 (a target that survived last week’s bonfire of deadlines) can be met without upsetting a few local interests.

The relevant passage in the speech came after the one about how we will be saved from the menace of seven recycling bins, so may have been lost in the laughter. Here’s what Sunak said: “The chancellor and energy security secretary will shortly bring forward comprehensive new reforms to energy infrastructure. We’ll set out the UK’s first ever spatial plan for that infrastructure to give industry certainty and every community a say.”

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Then consider the scale of what is being planned nationally. “In Great Britain, around four times as much new transmission network will be needed in the next seven years as was built since 1990,” said Nick Winser, the new electricity commissioner in his report to government last month.

It has to happen so quickly for several reasons. First, there’s already a queue of projects waiting to be connected to the grid – enough to generate more than half of our future electricity needs, Sunak said. Second, the planning nightmare is having to pay renewable generators to stand idle because the system can’t handle their output; such “annual constraint costs” could rise from £500m-£1bn in 2022 to £2bn-£4bn a year by about 2030, warned Winser. Third, the 2035 deadline looms, which is why Winser was tasked with finding a way to deliver major power projects in seven years rather than the usual 14.