A damning new report blows apart Labour’s claim that renewable energy is “cheap” in the net zero crusade. The report, authored by Professor of Economic Policy at the University of Oxford, Dieter Helm, slams Ed Miliband as “deluded” for thinking the UK can reach net zero by 2030 and bring down bills by £300. Helm also points out:
Meanwhile, energy regulator Ofgem blamed wind farms for the energy price cap rise this morning, citing the increase in balancing costs – where the National Grid must pay to switch power plants on or off to keep the lights on – as a driving factor. Red Ed’s promise to bring down bills is just more hot air…
The US is expanding its offshore oil and gas discovery while operators in the UK warn of punishingly high windfall taxes. Compare, contrast…
The White House has scheduled the inaugural sale under its new law, called Big Beautiful Gulf 1, for 10 December this year. More than 30 sales of federal land for oil and gas drilling are now scheduled over the next 15 years…
The Gulf of America will have to conduct a minimum of two offshore lease sales by 2039 starting from next year 2026. Similarly, Alaska with its Cook inlet has to have at least six offshore sales before 2032. There will also be quarterly onshore sales in western states. Over in the UK a windfall tax is deterring all activity…
Ithaca Energy – one of the UK’s largest operators – is calling for a change to the 38% Energy Profits Levy or for it to be scrapped. The levy expires if oil falls below $71.40 a barrel and gas prices drop beneath 54 pence per therm for six months. Oil has traded below that for some months now. Projections show that current net zero policies will lose 1,000 industry jobs per month between now and 2030. Miliband not keen on energy security…
Oil and gas trade association Offshore Energies UK has written to Starmer warning that Labour’s net zero drive will lead to nearly 1,000 direct and indirect industry job losses a month between now and 2030. That’s around 52,000 jobs up in smoke…
Chief Executive David Whitehouse slammed the uncertainty caused by Labour’s windfall tax raid and Miliband’s push to kill off new North Sea licences. He added:
“Today, we are seeing skilled jobs being lost on a scale that would be unacceptable in any other sector… Almost 1,000 direct and indirect jobs are set to be lost every month between now and 2030. But with supportive government policies, it doesn’t have to be this way.”
OEUK noted that Britain’s energy imports hit 40% last year, leading to higher emissions, fewer UK jobs and no tax revenue. Miliband determined to offshore both production and livelihoods…
In a latest blow to Red Ed’s net zero crusade, Britain’s biggest power generator has warned that falling wind speeds are driving up energy bills – and that’s unlikely to change anytime soon. RWE, which supplies around 15% of the UK’s electricity and increasingly relies on wind power said:
“Wholesale electricity prices in our European core markets also rose. Contributing factors were an increase in the price of fuels and emission allowances as well as unfavourable wind conditions.”
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change forecasts that global winds will continue to slow in the decades ahead. Though when there’s too much wind, bill-payers have to pay farms to turn turbines off. Brits are set cough up £1.26 billion in “constraint payments” this year…
At the same time, Miliband is planning to pay developers up to £116 per megawatt hour for the power they generate from wind farms, adding an estimated £24 a year to the average domestic power bill. Red Ed’s big energy plan just more hot air…
President Trump is in Scotland right now. Before rinsing Keir Starmer to his face at a press conference earlier, POTUS slammed the ugly wind farm visible from his golf course in Aberdeenshire…
Guido has been looking into the wind farm, known as the European Offshore Wind Deployment Centre. It only has 11 turbines and was intended as a ‘demonstration’ facility – e.g. a proof-of-concept wind farm designed to be shown off to developers. 2023 is the most recent year for which its financial accounts are published. According to these, the wind farm generated 270,562 MWh, and received £45.2 million in subsidies, and £24.3 million in income from electricity sales. In other words, 65% of its income is from government subsidies, that is, from ordinary payers in their energy bills…
We also know that it received an average price of £256.8/MWh, which compares to average wholesale electricity prices in 2023 of £94.17/MWh. So the hated wind farm slammed by the President is receiving an insane 2.73 times the market price for its output. Trump called the wind farm a “con job.” By Guido’s maths, he’s absolutely right…
UPDATE: Commenting, Harry Wilkinson from GWPF said:
“We’ve been locked into appallingly expensive deals with offshore wind. These are correctly described a ‘con job’, but Miliband is threatening to make things worse with his 2030 clean power plan. Decades ago we were promised that renewable subsidies would not be needed for long and would eventually get prices down. The plan hasn’t worked and we’re still paying through the nose.”
Co-conspirators will remember when Pat McFadden ordered an “immediate freeze” on government procurement cards back in early March. In February – before the so-called ‘freeze’ – Department for Energy, Security and Net Zero civil servants racked up a tidy £30,889 bill. In March, after the freeze was supposedly in effect, spending surged to £50,161. A 62% increase…
Somehow the pen-pushers managed to spaff £40,578 of that on a gift voucher company “Appreciate Group plc”. The firm offers “Love2shop Gift Card, a pre-paid gift card; Love2shop Gift Voucher, a multi-retailer voucher; Love2shop Holidays.” Taxpayer cash going up in smoke…
Last month Guido revealed staffing costs at the DESNZ had surged by £16 million since Red Ed Miliband took charge – hiring an extra 3,564 mandarins. More staff, more gift vouchers…
Paula Barker, Liverpool Wavertree MP backing Andy Burnham, told Times Radio there wouldn’t be trouble from the markets under Burnham:
“The markets will have to fall in line.”