Post by marchesarosa on Jul 29, 2012 12:49:14 GMT 1
From Christopher Booker
The Government plans to break its own climate change law
Politicians are finally admitting that our 'carbon' targets and our energy needs are incompatible
www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/christopherbooker/9434114/The-Government-plans-to-break-its-own-climate-change-law.html
....that is what we can read between the lines of last week’s statement by Ed Davey, Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change...
...The reports dutifully echoed DECC’s claim that this would bring “£25 billion of investment into the UK economy”, while Mr Davey was allowed by the Today programme to get away with the risible claim that this would “create hundreds of thousands of green jobs”.
......Mr Davey and his officials have begun to realise that they are impaled on two wholly irreconcilable hooks. On one hand, they are under two legal obligations: a commitment to the EU that we will generate 32 per cent of our electricity from “renewables” by 2020; and, under the Climate Change Act, that we will cut our “carbon emissions” by 80 per cent within 40 years.
.......in 2010, the last year for which we have figures, we used 378 TWh of electricity, of which only 10 TWh, or 2.6 per cent, came from wind.
......If 3,000-odd turbines produced 2.6 per cent in 2010, then to meet the EU target would require something like the “32,000 turbines” mentioned by Davey’s predecessor Chris Huhne just before he resigned. This would require us to build about 10 giant turbines every day for the next eight years. Regardless of how many billions of pounds of subsidy might be thrown at this, in practical terms it is quite out of the question.
........ An even more revealing passage, however, is one that concedes that we are going to need more gas-fired power stations. Gas, says Davey, will remain “an important part of the energy mix”, not just to provide back-up for all those wind turbines when the wind isn’t blowing, but also to meet our “everyday demands” to 2030 and beyond.
........what we see emerging here for the first time is an official admission that, in order to keep our lights on and our economy running, we have no alternative but to rely massively on fossil-fuel gas, which will drive a coach and horses through the Climate Change Act’s target of an 80 per cent emissions cut.
.......not the least telling feature of last week’s statement was that it made no reference to the shale gas revolution which has already halved US gas prices in five years, and which could solve our own energy problems by providing cheap gas for centuries.
..........One day we will have our shale gas and we will see the Climate Change Act repealed. These things will happen because the penny is finally dropping that the only alternative is economic suicide. But as yet, our politicians are unable to admit openly the enormity of the mess they have landed us in.
The Government plans to break its own climate change law
Politicians are finally admitting that our 'carbon' targets and our energy needs are incompatible
www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/christopherbooker/9434114/The-Government-plans-to-break-its-own-climate-change-law.html
....that is what we can read between the lines of last week’s statement by Ed Davey, Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change...
...The reports dutifully echoed DECC’s claim that this would bring “£25 billion of investment into the UK economy”, while Mr Davey was allowed by the Today programme to get away with the risible claim that this would “create hundreds of thousands of green jobs”.
......Mr Davey and his officials have begun to realise that they are impaled on two wholly irreconcilable hooks. On one hand, they are under two legal obligations: a commitment to the EU that we will generate 32 per cent of our electricity from “renewables” by 2020; and, under the Climate Change Act, that we will cut our “carbon emissions” by 80 per cent within 40 years.
.......in 2010, the last year for which we have figures, we used 378 TWh of electricity, of which only 10 TWh, or 2.6 per cent, came from wind.
......If 3,000-odd turbines produced 2.6 per cent in 2010, then to meet the EU target would require something like the “32,000 turbines” mentioned by Davey’s predecessor Chris Huhne just before he resigned. This would require us to build about 10 giant turbines every day for the next eight years. Regardless of how many billions of pounds of subsidy might be thrown at this, in practical terms it is quite out of the question.
........ An even more revealing passage, however, is one that concedes that we are going to need more gas-fired power stations. Gas, says Davey, will remain “an important part of the energy mix”, not just to provide back-up for all those wind turbines when the wind isn’t blowing, but also to meet our “everyday demands” to 2030 and beyond.
........what we see emerging here for the first time is an official admission that, in order to keep our lights on and our economy running, we have no alternative but to rely massively on fossil-fuel gas, which will drive a coach and horses through the Climate Change Act’s target of an 80 per cent emissions cut.
.......not the least telling feature of last week’s statement was that it made no reference to the shale gas revolution which has already halved US gas prices in five years, and which could solve our own energy problems by providing cheap gas for centuries.
..........One day we will have our shale gas and we will see the Climate Change Act repealed. These things will happen because the penny is finally dropping that the only alternative is economic suicide. But as yet, our politicians are unable to admit openly the enormity of the mess they have landed us in.