WE regularly hear that so-called renewables are the cheapest way of generating electricity. Not true. While wind and solar are free the costs of actually using these are enormous. A Byzantine structure of subsidies means their cost soars. The Renewables Obligation weighs in at £7.6 billion per annum. Contracts for Difference at £2.4bn. Grid balancing costs £2.5bn. Paying for the Capacity Market £1bn. These costs – and some others – mean that every megawatt of wind power needs £113 in subsidies. Add in the market price of the electricity and you have a cost of £180/Mwh. Gas-generated electricity works out at £83/Mwh. And if President Trump can secure a peace deal and get Russian gas flowing again to Europe gas prices will tumble.
During a dunkelflaute, when grey windless days predominate, wind machines don’t work. At night neither do the huge solar farms which are spreading across fertile farmland. Ed Miliband, the UK Energy Secretary, however, claims they will bring us resilience and energy security with Chinese lithium battery yards popping up everywhere taking up the slack, even though these can supply a small amount of power for only two hours. Mr Miliband is going to spend £22bn on carbon capture schemes to store 1% of Britain’s anthropogenic CO2 under the North Sea.
We should listen to Professor RG Faulkner of Loughborough University when he says: “In his push towards net zero Ed Miliband is committing us to a miserable future.” Tory leader Kemi Badenoch agrees, saying reaching net zero by 2050 is a fiction which could bankrupt Britain (“Badenoch says ‘get real’ on net zero and declares 2050 target ‘impossible’”, heraldscotland, March 18).
William Loneskie
Lauder
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