UK energy policy seems to be in a mess. For example, it’s very odd that, given the huge problem of rising power bills, the government is still constraining the expansion onshore wind, outside of a few local projects. UCL’s Prof. Mike Grubb told the FT (10/4/22), that it was ‘our cheapest energy resource - it typically costs about a third to a quarter of what people will soon be paying for their electricity - but it is, with solar, the only one that could make a dent in the short term’.
On shore wind is also now very popular, with 80 % backing it in the last official poll. In a more recent Opinium poll, 79% of Tory voters asked backed winds farms, as did 83% of Labour voters, but only 46% of all voters backed nuclear and that fell to under a third for nuclear plants near them.
Picking up on the nuclear issue, Grubb commented that : ‘Nuclear is not only slow and expensive, it would need to be flexible to ramp up and down with the swings of demand, wind and solar. This further undermines the economics. Launching a 30-year plan for nuclear raises the question - why can’t the government set out even a coherent 30-month plan for energy efficiency?’ Certainly energy saving would be a cheaper option than new nuclear- and it is very much home grown. The recent spending plan did remove VAT from some energy efficiency materials, but the government’s main focus seems to have been on attracting overseas investment into big speculative nuclear deals. China may be out of the running now, but South Korea may be in! That’s a bit confusing since Energy Minister Greg Hands says ‘one of the huge advantages of nuclear is that it is, very largely, homegrown’.
Even with investment from outside, new nuclear, with one new plant envisaged every year, is going to be very expensive- with the extra costs passed on to consumers via a surcharge on their bills to fund construction. But if we can consider something like that, then why not also take a new look at tidal power- that too may initially be expensive, but some tidal technologies could well get cheap as the technology and the market develops, as happened with offshore wind. And tidal technology is very much home grown. As BEIS has noted ‘The UK is a global leader in tidal power, to the extent that almost 50% of the world’s installed tidal stream capacity is in UK waters.’
Before the governments new energy security strategy was launched, there were indications that tidal power might get a new look in. But nothing new has emerged so far- or on hydro. Simon Hamlyn, chief executive of the British Hydropower Association (BHA), said the government had missed a ‘massive opportunity’ by failing to include tidal lagoons, tidal barrages and hydropower as a major element in its new energy strategy. He said: ‘It’s an incomprehensible omission. I simply cannot understand why the government continues to dismiss hydropower and tidal range – both of which are world-beating technologies and which could power the UK into the future.’
The BHA was supporting a number of potential tidal range projects, including the North Wales Tidal Lagoon and a proposed £590m scheme at the Port of Mostyn in Flintshire, north Wales. There are also proposals for tidal schemes on the West Somerset coast, in Morecambe Bay and on Merseyside. The BHA said that, overall, these various schemes could deliver over 10% of UK power.
A spokesperson for the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy said: ‘The government absolutely recognises the great potential of tidal power. This is why we have provided the marine energy sector with £175m of innovation and research and development funding, as well as ringfencing a £20m budget for tidal stream energy, for which bids are expected for Welsh projects.’
Well, we will have to see if any tidal stream projects make it through this ringfenced bit of the CfD competitive auction route. That would be a first. And on shore wind too- will some be allowed through at last? The pressure is certainly building up for that. In its recent special energy issue, New Ground, the magazine of Labour’s green lobby group SERA, included the comment that: ‘Onshore wind is the cheapest, safest and cleanest form of renewable energy. We could have onshore wind next year coming on stream, and this would have a direct impact on the ongoing cost of living crisis as well as the necessity to achievement zero; the government’s excuses for not including this in their strategy are farcical’.
The way onshore wind has been blocked politically over the years certainly is very striking. Same for energy efficiency- with recent plans for expansion cut back at the last minute. Perhaps it’s time for new energy policies, both in terms of national plans and programmes, and internationally, in terms of energy responses to the war in the Ukraine, where gaps are opening up with the EU’s stance.
The UK has done well on offshore wind, but otherwise there is arguably a lot wrong with the energy programme as it stands. Time for a change- though it’s hard to see who can lead that politically, with Labour, and also the Lib Dems, still wedded to nuclear power. That just leaves the Greens and, in Scotland, the SNP, with a policy collision over UK nuclear plans likely there.
It is hard to see why nuclear stays so firmly on the agenda when the economics look so poor, progress is uncertain and the strategic case for expansion looks so weak. As the Nuclear Consultation Group say in their evidence to the House of Lords Economic Affairs Committee: ‘It is clear that new nuclear cannot help in any way with the current energy crisis of cost and security of supply and it is highly unlikely new nuclear plants could be built in time to help achieve the Net Zero by 2050 target. The Government’s Impact Assessment published with the RAB legislation states the government does not expect the first station in a new reactor programme would be operational before 2036 at the earliest’. But some see an industrial-military link up as at least part of the explanation- and certainly defence concerns, real or imaginary, can trump all other considerations. Jonathon Porritt goes the whole hog and says ‘the truth of it is that we’ll never have energy security in this country as long as we persist with the belief that our national security still depends on maintaining an independent nuclear deterrent’. Is that going too far?
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