With the energy policy debate churning on, I thought I would look back at what has sometimes been seen as useful metric for comparison of energy options - Energy Return on Energy Invested (EROEI). That’s a measure of how much energy you have to use to build (and where relevant, run) an energy supply system, compared with how much energy you get out of it over its lifetime of operation. For example, as fossil fuel resources get scarcer and harder to extract, the EROEI ratios for their use are falling (e.g. from 44:1 in 1950, to 8:1 in 2020 for oil) this being one more reason why they are on the way out . In terms of the non-fossil energy options, in some (but not all) studies I have seen, renewables generally do much better than nuclear, their only supply side rival, which should be no surprise, since (bio energy systems apart) renewables do not need any fuel to run. With nuclear, energy has to be used to mine, mill and process uranium ore into fuel, and the amount of energy needed...
‘I am determined that we meet the commitment on which Labour was elected and reach net zero by 2050.’ So said UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham - although still not coming off the fence on the oil and gas issue (see my last post ). But he was adamant that ‘the climate crisis presents us with an enormous challenge and possibility. In the coming years, we need to change the way we travel, the way we build homes and the way we produce energy. I have long seen the green transition as the best chance we will ever have to reindustrialise Britain.’ However, he said, ‘I believe there are two routes we can follow. There’s the traditional Whitehall way: make people pay for the change with more regulation and higher costs, and allow private companies to reap the rewards. Or we can pursue a different route: help people make the change by creating jobs, lowering bills and bringing power back to them’. And he strongly backed the community energy ‘peoples power’ approach being develope...