In this newsletter:
1) UK cannot afford to pay climate change ‘reparations’, warns Boris Johnson
Financial Times, 7 November 2022
2) Green Britain: UK families suffer biggest hit to income of world’s richest nations
The Daily Telegraph, 7 November 2022
3) The SUN Says: Tories have lost the plot even discussing climate change ‘reparations’ to foreign countries at COP27
Editorial, The Sun, 8 November 2022
4) China pumps out more pollution in eight years than UK since Industrial Revolution
The Daily Telegraph, 7 November 2022
5) UK steel industry warns it needs state aid to survive green transition
Financial Times, 6 November 2022
6) Robert Tombs: Climate change reparations are a toxic distraction
The Daily Telegraph, 8 November 2022
7) Andy Shaw: Energy crisis? What energy crisis?
Spiked, 8 November 2022
Financial Times, 7 November 2022
2) Green Britain: UK families suffer biggest hit to income of world’s richest nations
The Daily Telegraph, 7 November 2022
3) The SUN Says: Tories have lost the plot even discussing climate change ‘reparations’ to foreign countries at COP27
Editorial, The Sun, 8 November 2022
4) China pumps out more pollution in eight years than UK since Industrial Revolution
The Daily Telegraph, 7 November 2022
5) UK steel industry warns it needs state aid to survive green transition
Financial Times, 6 November 2022
6) Robert Tombs: Climate change reparations are a toxic distraction
The Daily Telegraph, 8 November 2022
7) Andy Shaw: Energy crisis? What energy crisis?
Spiked, 8 November 2022
8) Wind lobby concedes its 'cheap-energy' pledge was a big mistake
Bloomberg, 7 November 2022
Bloomberg, 7 November 2022
9) Net zero sceptics set to meet climate adviser reviewing target
BBC News, 7 November 2022
BBC News, 7 November 2022
Full details:
1) UK cannot afford to pay climate change ‘reparations’, warns Boris Johnson
Financial Times, 7 November 2022
Financial Times, 7 November 2022
Former UK prime minister Boris Johnson on Monday said the UK did not have the financial resources to pay “reparations” to low-income countries affected by climate change.
Speaking at an event organised by the New York Times at COP27 in Egypt, Johnson said climate action had been “one of the most important collateral victims” of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and called for leaders not to give in to “energy blackmail”.
He said net zero would have to be achieved through investments from the private sector in partnership with the international community rather than through taxpayers in western countries.
“Per capita, people in the UK put a lot of carbon in the atmosphere,” Johnson said. “But what we cannot do I’m afraid is make up for that with some sort of reparations, we simply do not have the financial resources.”
2) Green Britain: UK families suffer biggest hit to income of world’s richest nations
The Daily Telegraph, 7 November 2022
Speaking at an event organised by the New York Times at COP27 in Egypt, Johnson said climate action had been “one of the most important collateral victims” of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and called for leaders not to give in to “energy blackmail”.
He said net zero would have to be achieved through investments from the private sector in partnership with the international community rather than through taxpayers in western countries.
“Per capita, people in the UK put a lot of carbon in the atmosphere,” Johnson said. “But what we cannot do I’m afraid is make up for that with some sort of reparations, we simply do not have the financial resources.”
2) Green Britain: UK families suffer biggest hit to income of world’s richest nations
The Daily Telegraph, 7 November 2022
Britain is suffering the worst cost of living crunch of any G7 nation, as the combined effects of the pandemic and the energy crisis drain households’ finances.
Real household incomes per capita have dropped by 3.5pc between the end of 2019 and the second quarter of this year, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).
This is ten-times the 0.3pc drop experienced in France, and compares with a rise in real incomes in countries including Germany and the US.
However they are also starting to suffer under the weight of rising energy prices and other costs.
Every G7 nation except Germany witnessed a fall in real incomes in the second quarter of this year as wages failed to keep pace with accelerating inflation.
Overall the OECD nations have seen real incomes per capita drop for three consecutive quarters so far.
This is a longer squeeze than that suffered in the financial crisis or at the height of the pandemic, as household bills soar.
Real incomes also plunged in the middle of last year, making the 5.4pc drop so far from the peak in real incomes in early 2021 the sharpest drop on record, exceeding the 2008-2009 fall of 1.6pc in the credit crunch.
3) The SUN Says: Tories have lost the plot even discussing climate change ‘reparations’ to foreign countries at COP27
Editorial, The Sun, 8 November 2022
Real household incomes per capita have dropped by 3.5pc between the end of 2019 and the second quarter of this year, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).
This is ten-times the 0.3pc drop experienced in France, and compares with a rise in real incomes in countries including Germany and the US.
However they are also starting to suffer under the weight of rising energy prices and other costs.
Every G7 nation except Germany witnessed a fall in real incomes in the second quarter of this year as wages failed to keep pace with accelerating inflation.
Overall the OECD nations have seen real incomes per capita drop for three consecutive quarters so far.
This is a longer squeeze than that suffered in the financial crisis or at the height of the pandemic, as household bills soar.
Real incomes also plunged in the middle of last year, making the 5.4pc drop so far from the peak in real incomes in early 2021 the sharpest drop on record, exceeding the 2008-2009 fall of 1.6pc in the credit crunch.
3) The SUN Says: Tories have lost the plot even discussing climate change ‘reparations’ to foreign countries at COP27
Editorial, The Sun, 8 November 2022
We doubt there’s a policy crazier or more likely to lose an election than making skint voters pay billions in climate change “reparations” to foreign countries.
We expect such lunacy from the Left, Ed Miliband in particular.
Indeed he has plenty more. But the Tories have lost the plot even by discussing it at COP27.
The theory goes that Britain triggered the global industrial revolution 200 years ago and should bail out nations worst hit by the warming effect since.
Let’s leave aside that Pakistan, now badly flooded, can afford nukes.
Or that Britain has now slashed its CO2 emissions faster than other major economies. If every country must now settle up over its past, where do we start?
Shouldn’t we get a trillion-pound thank-you from every other country for lifting billions out of pre-industrial peasantry? Or a bung every time someone is saved by vaccination, transported by train, entertained by TV or informed by the web — all invented by Brits?
Answer: No. It would be as absurd as climate reparations.
Boris Johnson, at least, gets that. But it’s not just that we can’t afford it. It’s because billing nations for deeds centuries ago is ludicrous.
We have a far stronger case for claiming £407billion damages from China over Covid. That was only in 2019.
4) China pumps out more pollution in eight years than UK since Industrial Revolution
The Daily Telegraph, 7 November 2022
We expect such lunacy from the Left, Ed Miliband in particular.
Indeed he has plenty more. But the Tories have lost the plot even by discussing it at COP27.
The theory goes that Britain triggered the global industrial revolution 200 years ago and should bail out nations worst hit by the warming effect since.
Let’s leave aside that Pakistan, now badly flooded, can afford nukes.
Or that Britain has now slashed its CO2 emissions faster than other major economies. If every country must now settle up over its past, where do we start?
Shouldn’t we get a trillion-pound thank-you from every other country for lifting billions out of pre-industrial peasantry? Or a bung every time someone is saved by vaccination, transported by train, entertained by TV or informed by the web — all invented by Brits?
Answer: No. It would be as absurd as climate reparations.
Boris Johnson, at least, gets that. But it’s not just that we can’t afford it. It’s because billing nations for deeds centuries ago is ludicrous.
We have a far stronger case for claiming £407billion damages from China over Covid. That was only in 2019.
4) China pumps out more pollution in eight years than UK since Industrial Revolution
The Daily Telegraph, 7 November 2022
China has emitted more carbon dioxide over the past eight years than the UK has since the start of the Industrial Revolution, figures have shown.
Between 1750 and 2020, the UK emitted 78 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, compared with China’s emissions of 80 billion tonnes since 2013.
The UK has indicated it is open to paying “climate change reparations” to climate vulnerable countries and will discuss the issue at the ongoing Cop27 summit.
However, China is unlikely to be party to an arrangement because it still considers itself a developing country.
This is despite China having emitted 14 per cent of all emissions throughout history, surpassed only by the United States, which has emitted 25 per cent of all emissions.
The UK, in comparison, has emitted just 4.6 per cent of all historic emissions - the fifth highest in the world. Around 80 per cent of these occurred before 1990.
Today, the UK emits less than one per cent of all global emissions each year and, once adjusting for population, ranks 68th in global per capita emissions.
China, on the other hand, is responsible for 30 per cent of all global emissions each year, ranking 42nd in per capita emissions.
Full story
5) UK steel industry warns it needs state aid to survive green transition
Financial Times, 6 November 2022
Between 1750 and 2020, the UK emitted 78 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, compared with China’s emissions of 80 billion tonnes since 2013.
The UK has indicated it is open to paying “climate change reparations” to climate vulnerable countries and will discuss the issue at the ongoing Cop27 summit.
However, China is unlikely to be party to an arrangement because it still considers itself a developing country.
This is despite China having emitted 14 per cent of all emissions throughout history, surpassed only by the United States, which has emitted 25 per cent of all emissions.
The UK, in comparison, has emitted just 4.6 per cent of all historic emissions - the fifth highest in the world. Around 80 per cent of these occurred before 1990.
Today, the UK emits less than one per cent of all global emissions each year and, once adjusting for population, ranks 68th in global per capita emissions.
China, on the other hand, is responsible for 30 per cent of all global emissions each year, ranking 42nd in per capita emissions.
Full story
5) UK steel industry warns it needs state aid to survive green transition
Financial Times, 6 November 2022
In the hazy gloom of a cavernous building at Tata Steel’s sprawling Port Talbot complex in south Wales, streams of molten iron come hissing out of one of the site’s two blast furnaces.
The scene, which has been at the heart of the steelmaking process here for decades, is now under threat as the industry looks to lower carbon emissions. Dean Cartwright, works manager for coke, sinter and iron, who has been at the plant for 24 years, said locals still wanted to work at the area’s biggest employer but were increasingly aware it was facing a serious challenge.
“There is lots of talk about decarbonisation. People automatically think, ‘will I still have a job’,” Cartwright added.
Tata is weighing the hugely expensive shift of moving Port Talbot — the UK’s biggest steelmaking plant — to a less-polluting way of making steel, a transformation that the company said would need government support.
They are not alone. Tata Steel UK, a subsidiary of the Indian conglomerate that owns Port Talbot, and China’s Jingye, the owner of British Steel, the UK’s second-largest producer at Scunthorpe in Lincolnshire, are both in talks with the government over financial support. They have warned that without taxpayer help they could be forced to close their operations, leaving the UK as the only large economy without primary, or virgin, steel production.
The companies, which together operate Britain’s last four blast furnaces, want help to cover the huge cost of shifting from traditional, energy-intensive steelmaking to greener alternatives to reduce their carbon emissions. Analysts have estimated that it would cost about £2bn to decarbonise Port Talbot alone. Jingye has also asked for short-term aid to help its business through the recent jump in energy and carbon prices.
More than 4,000 jobs are at stake at Port Talbot and another 4,000 at British Steel, most of them at Scunthorpe, with thousands more at risk in the supply chain.
Industry executives have warned of wider consequences if the steel plants close: without low-carbon domestic steel, Britain would not have its own source of a basic material needed to reduce emissions in other industries, such as construction.
Full story
6) Robert Tombs: Climate change reparations are a toxic distraction
The Daily Telegraph, 8 November 2022
The scene, which has been at the heart of the steelmaking process here for decades, is now under threat as the industry looks to lower carbon emissions. Dean Cartwright, works manager for coke, sinter and iron, who has been at the plant for 24 years, said locals still wanted to work at the area’s biggest employer but were increasingly aware it was facing a serious challenge.
“There is lots of talk about decarbonisation. People automatically think, ‘will I still have a job’,” Cartwright added.
Tata is weighing the hugely expensive shift of moving Port Talbot — the UK’s biggest steelmaking plant — to a less-polluting way of making steel, a transformation that the company said would need government support.
They are not alone. Tata Steel UK, a subsidiary of the Indian conglomerate that owns Port Talbot, and China’s Jingye, the owner of British Steel, the UK’s second-largest producer at Scunthorpe in Lincolnshire, are both in talks with the government over financial support. They have warned that without taxpayer help they could be forced to close their operations, leaving the UK as the only large economy without primary, or virgin, steel production.
The companies, which together operate Britain’s last four blast furnaces, want help to cover the huge cost of shifting from traditional, energy-intensive steelmaking to greener alternatives to reduce their carbon emissions. Analysts have estimated that it would cost about £2bn to decarbonise Port Talbot alone. Jingye has also asked for short-term aid to help its business through the recent jump in energy and carbon prices.
More than 4,000 jobs are at stake at Port Talbot and another 4,000 at British Steel, most of them at Scunthorpe, with thousands more at risk in the supply chain.
Industry executives have warned of wider consequences if the steel plants close: without low-carbon domestic steel, Britain would not have its own source of a basic material needed to reduce emissions in other industries, such as construction.
Full story
6) Robert Tombs: Climate change reparations are a toxic distraction
The Daily Telegraph, 8 November 2022
Blaming all the planet’s problems on Britain’s Industrial Revolution is irrational buck-passing
When climate change is mentioned, vast amounts of money are soon an inevitable topic of conversation. Who will pay and who will receive? On what terms, and who decides what happens to the cash? One does not have to be a cynic to recall a definition of foreign aid as money transferred from poor people in rich countries to rich people in poor countries.
There are certainly places that need and deserve urgent help, particularly small islands and low-lying countries threatened by rising sea levels. Some of them have historic links to Britain, which like other countries gives a large amount of aid. But the money so far pledged is small compared to the trillions of dollars that are now the subject of negotiation – or perhaps one might more accurately say, of peremptory demands.
If the world is to mitigate climate change, rational analysis and effective action are essential. But they are in short supply. Greta Thunberg heralds the destruction of capitalism and lobbyists in developing countries call for payment for “loss and damage”, which some immediately call “reparations”.
This injects a toxic element of polemic, encouraged by useful idiots in Britain. If the discussion can be channelled into accusations of historic guilt, questions of effectiveness, accountability and need get obscured.
Those making the demands and claiming victim status – the trump card of modern politics – no longer have to justify themselves, even if they have neglected flood defences in favour of space programmes and nuclear weapons, and are building huge numbers of coal-burning power stations. Those being asked to provide an open cheque book are told to hang their heads in shame, sign on the dotted line and ask no awkward questions about corruption and competence.
Britain, needless to say, is one of the first countries to be hauled into the dock, accused of historic responsibility for industrialisation. Those far away pioneers, once heroes, who invented Puffing Billy and the spinning jenny, become villains in the climate change melodrama.
So absurd is this way of thinking – can it really be sincere, or is it just a ploy to extract money? – that it does not stand up to a moment’s reflection. On the one hand, Britain’s Industrial Revolution in itself created an unmeasurably small amount of pollution in global terms. If China, the US, India and Russia today choose to burn millions of tonnes of coal and oil every year, it cannot be blamed on James Watt’s steam engine. Today’s levels of atmospheric pollution essentially began 150 years after the Industrial Revolution.
But if, in defiance of logic, we insist on dragging into the argument the 18th-century beginnings of economic change, then we would have to acknowledge the Industrial Revolution as the root cause of almost all the advances in human society since the 1750s. If James Watt is responsible for global warming, then he must also be credited with the huge benefits of modernity, including the fact that most of us today are alive. Demands for reparations are a transparent attempt by today’s major and increasing polluters, including the likes of China and India, to pass the buck.
If slavery can be dragged into the conversation, so much the better for the buck passers. It once again becomes ideologically useful to assert that Britain’s involvement in the 18th-century slave trade provided the capital that funded the Industrial Revolution and hence explains Britain’s modern wealth. By this account, we started off the “climate emergency” in the 1750s, and we did so because we profited from the evils of slavery.
So all our prosperity is ill-gotten, and “reparations” are the least we can do. It’s a neat rhetorical trick, but it only works if the profits of the slave trade really did cause industrialisation. No serious economic history supports this notion. Slave trading enriched a few people, but provided nowhere near enough capital to transform the economy. Britain was already a wealthy country in the 18th century, and industrialisation arose from a generally dynamic economy and the accessibility of large coal reserves.
We did, for a time, import slave-grown cotton even after Britain abolished the slave trade, and this was indeed a boost to industrialisation everywhere. Similarly, today we all use products manufactured in China using unfree labour and creating vast CO2 emissions. This dwarfs the responsibility of our early 19th-century forebears, who did their best to wean themselves off slave-produced goods. But today, even our wind turbines largely seem to be made in China using fossil fuels.
Yes, we must limit climate damage. Wealthy countries will pay more. Big polluters must cut back. But it is too important an issue to be left to Green utopians, virtue signallers and corrupt despots. Absurd demands for historic “reparations” are a distraction from the real issues, and a smoke screen (for once the cliché seems appropriate) for today’s major polluters. Can we be optimistic that sense will prevail? I fear not.
Robert Tombs is professor emeritus of history at the University of Cambridge
When climate change is mentioned, vast amounts of money are soon an inevitable topic of conversation. Who will pay and who will receive? On what terms, and who decides what happens to the cash? One does not have to be a cynic to recall a definition of foreign aid as money transferred from poor people in rich countries to rich people in poor countries.
There are certainly places that need and deserve urgent help, particularly small islands and low-lying countries threatened by rising sea levels. Some of them have historic links to Britain, which like other countries gives a large amount of aid. But the money so far pledged is small compared to the trillions of dollars that are now the subject of negotiation – or perhaps one might more accurately say, of peremptory demands.
If the world is to mitigate climate change, rational analysis and effective action are essential. But they are in short supply. Greta Thunberg heralds the destruction of capitalism and lobbyists in developing countries call for payment for “loss and damage”, which some immediately call “reparations”.
This injects a toxic element of polemic, encouraged by useful idiots in Britain. If the discussion can be channelled into accusations of historic guilt, questions of effectiveness, accountability and need get obscured.
Those making the demands and claiming victim status – the trump card of modern politics – no longer have to justify themselves, even if they have neglected flood defences in favour of space programmes and nuclear weapons, and are building huge numbers of coal-burning power stations. Those being asked to provide an open cheque book are told to hang their heads in shame, sign on the dotted line and ask no awkward questions about corruption and competence.
Britain, needless to say, is one of the first countries to be hauled into the dock, accused of historic responsibility for industrialisation. Those far away pioneers, once heroes, who invented Puffing Billy and the spinning jenny, become villains in the climate change melodrama.
So absurd is this way of thinking – can it really be sincere, or is it just a ploy to extract money? – that it does not stand up to a moment’s reflection. On the one hand, Britain’s Industrial Revolution in itself created an unmeasurably small amount of pollution in global terms. If China, the US, India and Russia today choose to burn millions of tonnes of coal and oil every year, it cannot be blamed on James Watt’s steam engine. Today’s levels of atmospheric pollution essentially began 150 years after the Industrial Revolution.
But if, in defiance of logic, we insist on dragging into the argument the 18th-century beginnings of economic change, then we would have to acknowledge the Industrial Revolution as the root cause of almost all the advances in human society since the 1750s. If James Watt is responsible for global warming, then he must also be credited with the huge benefits of modernity, including the fact that most of us today are alive. Demands for reparations are a transparent attempt by today’s major and increasing polluters, including the likes of China and India, to pass the buck.
If slavery can be dragged into the conversation, so much the better for the buck passers. It once again becomes ideologically useful to assert that Britain’s involvement in the 18th-century slave trade provided the capital that funded the Industrial Revolution and hence explains Britain’s modern wealth. By this account, we started off the “climate emergency” in the 1750s, and we did so because we profited from the evils of slavery.
So all our prosperity is ill-gotten, and “reparations” are the least we can do. It’s a neat rhetorical trick, but it only works if the profits of the slave trade really did cause industrialisation. No serious economic history supports this notion. Slave trading enriched a few people, but provided nowhere near enough capital to transform the economy. Britain was already a wealthy country in the 18th century, and industrialisation arose from a generally dynamic economy and the accessibility of large coal reserves.
We did, for a time, import slave-grown cotton even after Britain abolished the slave trade, and this was indeed a boost to industrialisation everywhere. Similarly, today we all use products manufactured in China using unfree labour and creating vast CO2 emissions. This dwarfs the responsibility of our early 19th-century forebears, who did their best to wean themselves off slave-produced goods. But today, even our wind turbines largely seem to be made in China using fossil fuels.
Yes, we must limit climate damage. Wealthy countries will pay more. Big polluters must cut back. But it is too important an issue to be left to Green utopians, virtue signallers and corrupt despots. Absurd demands for historic “reparations” are a distraction from the real issues, and a smoke screen (for once the cliché seems appropriate) for today’s major polluters. Can we be optimistic that sense will prevail? I fear not.
Robert Tombs is professor emeritus of history at the University of Cambridge
7) Andy Shaw: Energy crisis? What energy crisis?
Spiked, 8 November 2022
Spiked, 8 November 2022
Just as Boris Johnson’s embrace of the climate-change cause at COP26 preceded his downfall, the current energy crisis may well see off Sunak.
‘Crisis? What crisis?’ went the Sun’s famous headline, capturing Jim Callaghan’s complacency during the 1979 ‘Winter of Discontent’. The UK was suffering from rampant inflation, strikes and power blackouts. Callaghan had just returned from an international conference in Guadeloupe, tanned and smiling. In response to the journalists waiting for him at the airport, he said: ‘I don’t think that other people in the world would share the view that there is mounting chaos.’ The Sun’s headline was devastating.
This week, Rishi Sunak, like Callaghan before him, has escaped the winter weather, rampant inflation, strikes and the threat of power blackouts to soak up the Egyptian sunshine at the COP27 climate summit. His complacency about the energy crisis – and its cause – is as bad as Callaghan’s, if not worse. The truth is that Sunak’s commitment to the COP agenda betrays an indifference to the energy crisis. After all, climate-change policies are one of the leading causes of the current energy shortages. And if we go much further down the Net Zero pathway, the crisis will become permanent.
For nearly 20 years now, Britain’s political leaders have used international climate summits to declare that they are ‘leading the world on climate change’. Each time they have returned, they have announced new laws to double down on Net Zero or other emissions-reduction targets. Last month, knowing that COP27 was on the horizon, Sunak reintroduced the government’s ban on shale-gas extraction, or fracking. The damage was done before his plane had even taken off.
If we go back to the Climate Change Act 2008, we can see how climate-change policies have created the current shortage of gas and how whatever commitments we make at COP27 will likely make matters worse.
In 1990, electricity production and supply was privatised. Coupled with the closure of coal-fired power stations, electricity privatisation unleashed a decades-long ‘dash for gas’. Gas that was previously ‘flared off’ in the North Sea, and treated as a useless byproduct of oil extraction, was harnessed to generate electricity. In 11 years, from 1990 onwards, nearly 40 gas-fired power stations were built in the UK. Many made use of the latest technological advances, such as combined-cycle gas turbines (CCGT). Gas and electricity prices fell in most of the subsequent years and electricity production expanded.
This period of expansion came to an end following the introduction of the Climate Change Act in 2008. The use of gas-powered electricity generation peaked in 2008, when 157,416 GWh electricity was produced using natural gas. By 2021, natural gas was only producing 108,417 GWh.
The ‘dash for gas’ during the 1990s could have evolved into a 2000s boom in on-shore gas extraction. This is what happened in the US, when hydraulic fracturing techniques were used to tap into previously unrecoverable shale-gas deposits. The boom in US gas production has been so great that, in July this year, natural gas prices were nearly 10 times lower in the US market than in the European market. And the US is now exporting liquified natural gas (LNG) worldwide.
If we had utilised the same technology, we could have tapped into the abundant Bowland shale gas in northern England. This would have created a new booming energy industry throughout the depressed ex-mining areas of Lancashire, Yorkshire and the north east. Like the US, we could also be benefiting from LNG exports. And the ports of Grimsby, Teesside and Hull would be booming. But this was not to be.
Instead, our politicians have embraced green thinking, and revelled in the destruction of our fossil-fuel infrastructure. Last year, COP26 president and then government minister Alok Sharma proudly oversaw the demolition of Ferrybridge power station in Yorkshire. Indeed, power stations have been blown up all over the UK as a demonstration of the government’s commitment to tackling climate change. And as coal-, oil- and gas-fired power stations have been demolished, the government has flushed billions into wind power in the hope that it could make up the shortfall.
The numbers tell a clear story. In 1990, 284,304 GWh of electricity was produced for the UK grid. In 2005, electricity production peaked at 345,947 GWh, before falling from 2008 onwards, with the introduction of the Climate Change Act. In 2021, just 246,507 GWh of electricity was produced in the UK.
The turn away from gas and coal to wind power could lead to a shortage in electricity this winter. There may even be the return of 1970s-style blackouts. Ironically, as politicians are forcing cars and home heating to become electric, we will only need more electricity in future. Yet the amount of electricity we currently produce is at a 30-year low. Unless serious steps are taken to reverse this trend, future energy crises are inevitable.
Worryingly, Sunak’s attendance at COP27 shows that he is prioritising climate-change posturing over solving the domestic energy crisis. Just as Boris Johnson’s embrace of the climate-change cause at COP26 preceded his downfall, the current energy crisis may well see off Sunak. Crisis? Sunak hasn’t seen anything yet.
‘Crisis? What crisis?’ went the Sun’s famous headline, capturing Jim Callaghan’s complacency during the 1979 ‘Winter of Discontent’. The UK was suffering from rampant inflation, strikes and power blackouts. Callaghan had just returned from an international conference in Guadeloupe, tanned and smiling. In response to the journalists waiting for him at the airport, he said: ‘I don’t think that other people in the world would share the view that there is mounting chaos.’ The Sun’s headline was devastating.
This week, Rishi Sunak, like Callaghan before him, has escaped the winter weather, rampant inflation, strikes and the threat of power blackouts to soak up the Egyptian sunshine at the COP27 climate summit. His complacency about the energy crisis – and its cause – is as bad as Callaghan’s, if not worse. The truth is that Sunak’s commitment to the COP agenda betrays an indifference to the energy crisis. After all, climate-change policies are one of the leading causes of the current energy shortages. And if we go much further down the Net Zero pathway, the crisis will become permanent.
For nearly 20 years now, Britain’s political leaders have used international climate summits to declare that they are ‘leading the world on climate change’. Each time they have returned, they have announced new laws to double down on Net Zero or other emissions-reduction targets. Last month, knowing that COP27 was on the horizon, Sunak reintroduced the government’s ban on shale-gas extraction, or fracking. The damage was done before his plane had even taken off.
If we go back to the Climate Change Act 2008, we can see how climate-change policies have created the current shortage of gas and how whatever commitments we make at COP27 will likely make matters worse.
In 1990, electricity production and supply was privatised. Coupled with the closure of coal-fired power stations, electricity privatisation unleashed a decades-long ‘dash for gas’. Gas that was previously ‘flared off’ in the North Sea, and treated as a useless byproduct of oil extraction, was harnessed to generate electricity. In 11 years, from 1990 onwards, nearly 40 gas-fired power stations were built in the UK. Many made use of the latest technological advances, such as combined-cycle gas turbines (CCGT). Gas and electricity prices fell in most of the subsequent years and electricity production expanded.
This period of expansion came to an end following the introduction of the Climate Change Act in 2008. The use of gas-powered electricity generation peaked in 2008, when 157,416 GWh electricity was produced using natural gas. By 2021, natural gas was only producing 108,417 GWh.
The ‘dash for gas’ during the 1990s could have evolved into a 2000s boom in on-shore gas extraction. This is what happened in the US, when hydraulic fracturing techniques were used to tap into previously unrecoverable shale-gas deposits. The boom in US gas production has been so great that, in July this year, natural gas prices were nearly 10 times lower in the US market than in the European market. And the US is now exporting liquified natural gas (LNG) worldwide.
If we had utilised the same technology, we could have tapped into the abundant Bowland shale gas in northern England. This would have created a new booming energy industry throughout the depressed ex-mining areas of Lancashire, Yorkshire and the north east. Like the US, we could also be benefiting from LNG exports. And the ports of Grimsby, Teesside and Hull would be booming. But this was not to be.
Instead, our politicians have embraced green thinking, and revelled in the destruction of our fossil-fuel infrastructure. Last year, COP26 president and then government minister Alok Sharma proudly oversaw the demolition of Ferrybridge power station in Yorkshire. Indeed, power stations have been blown up all over the UK as a demonstration of the government’s commitment to tackling climate change. And as coal-, oil- and gas-fired power stations have been demolished, the government has flushed billions into wind power in the hope that it could make up the shortfall.
The numbers tell a clear story. In 1990, 284,304 GWh of electricity was produced for the UK grid. In 2005, electricity production peaked at 345,947 GWh, before falling from 2008 onwards, with the introduction of the Climate Change Act. In 2021, just 246,507 GWh of electricity was produced in the UK.
The turn away from gas and coal to wind power could lead to a shortage in electricity this winter. There may even be the return of 1970s-style blackouts. Ironically, as politicians are forcing cars and home heating to become electric, we will only need more electricity in future. Yet the amount of electricity we currently produce is at a 30-year low. Unless serious steps are taken to reverse this trend, future energy crises are inevitable.
Worryingly, Sunak’s attendance at COP27 shows that he is prioritising climate-change posturing over solving the domestic energy crisis. Just as Boris Johnson’s embrace of the climate-change cause at COP26 preceded his downfall, the current energy crisis may well see off Sunak. Crisis? Sunak hasn’t seen anything yet.
8) Wind lobby concedes its 'cheap-energy' pledge was big mistake
Bloomberg, 7 November 2022
Bloomberg, 7 November 2022
Soaring commodity costs and supply-chain bottlenecks have wiped out profits for much of the wind industry this year. Vestas expects its profit margin to be around -5% in 2022.
Manufacturers such as Vestas Wind Systems A/S are seeing losses pile up as orders collapse at a time when they should be capitalizing on the turmoil in natural-gas markets. To blame -- at least in part -- is the industry’s insistence that clean electricity can only get cheaper, according to Henrik Andersen, chief executive officer of the Danish wind giant.
“It made some people make the wrong assumption that energy and electricity should become free,” Andersen said in an interview in London. “We created the perception to some extent. So we are to blame for it. That was a mistake.”
While wind-power costs have steadily declined, to the point where many people concluded prices would eventually hit zero, technological advances can only go so far. Now the industry needs to charge more so that it can deliver the massive scale-up needed for countries to achieve ambitious climate goals.
Soaring commodity costs and supply-chain bottlenecks have wiped out profits for much of the wind industry this year. Vestas expects its profit margin to be around -5% in 2022.
“The output from the turbine has never been more valuable,” Andersen said. “But we are losing money in manufacturing a turbine.” Vestas has raised prices more than 30% in the past year to help stem losses.
Full story
Manufacturers such as Vestas Wind Systems A/S are seeing losses pile up as orders collapse at a time when they should be capitalizing on the turmoil in natural-gas markets. To blame -- at least in part -- is the industry’s insistence that clean electricity can only get cheaper, according to Henrik Andersen, chief executive officer of the Danish wind giant.
“It made some people make the wrong assumption that energy and electricity should become free,” Andersen said in an interview in London. “We created the perception to some extent. So we are to blame for it. That was a mistake.”
While wind-power costs have steadily declined, to the point where many people concluded prices would eventually hit zero, technological advances can only go so far. Now the industry needs to charge more so that it can deliver the massive scale-up needed for countries to achieve ambitious climate goals.
Soaring commodity costs and supply-chain bottlenecks have wiped out profits for much of the wind industry this year. Vestas expects its profit margin to be around -5% in 2022.
“The output from the turbine has never been more valuable,” Andersen said. “But we are losing money in manufacturing a turbine.” Vestas has raised prices more than 30% in the past year to help stem losses.
Full story
9) Net zero sceptics set to meet climate adviser reviewing target
BBC News, 7 November 2022
BBC News, 7 November 2022
Conservatives sceptical about the net zero target are set to have a meeting with the MP reviewing the government's approach to lowering carbon emissions.
Tory MP Chris Skidmore is examining the best way to cut emissions to net zero by 2050 while boosting economic growth.
MPs in the Net Zero Scrutiny Group have been campaigning for more UK oil and gas production to lower energy costs.
Green groups and MPs say they are worried about the meeting given the group's calls to rethink net zero.
The Green Party MP, Caroline Lucas, said "climate delayers" and those who impeded solutions to curbing emissions "should be nowhere near government policy".
Labour MP Clive Lewis said while members of the NZSG had "every right" to discuss net zero with Mr Skidmore, a meeting with him in the month of the COP27 climate conference in Egypt would send "a terrible message".
Speaking at the summit on its opening day, former Prime Minister Boris Johnson said now was "not the moment to go weak" on net zero as he expressed concerns over scepticism about the target in the UK.
Mr Skidmore has ruled out recommending scrapping or delaying net zero goals, and said his review will not look at fracking for UK shale gas.
A spokesperson for Mr Skidmore told the BBC he did not feel it was appropriate to prejudge or comment on the review at this time.
Mr Skidmore is one of the greenest Tory MPs and signed the 2050 emissions target into law in 2019, when he was an energy minister.
In September this year, former Prime Minister Liz Truss commissioned him to review the government's delivery of net zero, to ensure it was "pro-growth and pro-business".
Since then, Mr Skidmore has been roving the country to meet politicians, business leaders and energy experts as part of his evidence-gathering process.
Craig Mackinlay, chairman of the Net Zero Scrutiny Group (NZSG), told the BBC he had been speaking with Mr Skidmore even though "we couldn't be more opposed" on net zero.
The Tory MP for South Thanet said he didn't "care where we get our energy from" and wasn't "fixated on net zero".
"Whether it's nuclear, whether it's renewable, I don't care, as long as it's internationally competitive in terms of price," he said.
But he said he and Mr Skidmore had already "got agreement on some things" related to net zero, such as the need for better home insulation.
Mr Mackinlay said he would arrange a one-on-one with Mr Skidmore before setting up a more formal meeting to discuss net zero.
They had planned to meet last month at a think-tank roundtable, which was cancelled, Mr Mackinlay said.
Net zero divisions
While Tory MPs broadly agree on the need to lower emissions, they have different views on how to achieve net zero.
Members of the NZSG say they are mainly concerned about the costs of achieving the target by 2050 and insist they do not dispute the science on climate change.
Policies they have agitated for include a return to fracking shale gas in the UK, scrapping green levies on energy bills, and an increase in North Sea oil and gas production.
In January, Mr Skidmore launched a Net Zero Support Group to counter the arguments being made by Mr Mackinlay's group.
Full story
Tory MP Chris Skidmore is examining the best way to cut emissions to net zero by 2050 while boosting economic growth.
MPs in the Net Zero Scrutiny Group have been campaigning for more UK oil and gas production to lower energy costs.
Green groups and MPs say they are worried about the meeting given the group's calls to rethink net zero.
The Green Party MP, Caroline Lucas, said "climate delayers" and those who impeded solutions to curbing emissions "should be nowhere near government policy".
Labour MP Clive Lewis said while members of the NZSG had "every right" to discuss net zero with Mr Skidmore, a meeting with him in the month of the COP27 climate conference in Egypt would send "a terrible message".
Speaking at the summit on its opening day, former Prime Minister Boris Johnson said now was "not the moment to go weak" on net zero as he expressed concerns over scepticism about the target in the UK.
Mr Skidmore has ruled out recommending scrapping or delaying net zero goals, and said his review will not look at fracking for UK shale gas.
A spokesperson for Mr Skidmore told the BBC he did not feel it was appropriate to prejudge or comment on the review at this time.
Mr Skidmore is one of the greenest Tory MPs and signed the 2050 emissions target into law in 2019, when he was an energy minister.
In September this year, former Prime Minister Liz Truss commissioned him to review the government's delivery of net zero, to ensure it was "pro-growth and pro-business".
Since then, Mr Skidmore has been roving the country to meet politicians, business leaders and energy experts as part of his evidence-gathering process.
Craig Mackinlay, chairman of the Net Zero Scrutiny Group (NZSG), told the BBC he had been speaking with Mr Skidmore even though "we couldn't be more opposed" on net zero.
The Tory MP for South Thanet said he didn't "care where we get our energy from" and wasn't "fixated on net zero".
"Whether it's nuclear, whether it's renewable, I don't care, as long as it's internationally competitive in terms of price," he said.
But he said he and Mr Skidmore had already "got agreement on some things" related to net zero, such as the need for better home insulation.
Mr Mackinlay said he would arrange a one-on-one with Mr Skidmore before setting up a more formal meeting to discuss net zero.
They had planned to meet last month at a think-tank roundtable, which was cancelled, Mr Mackinlay said.
Net zero divisions
While Tory MPs broadly agree on the need to lower emissions, they have different views on how to achieve net zero.
Members of the NZSG say they are mainly concerned about the costs of achieving the target by 2050 and insist they do not dispute the science on climate change.
Policies they have agitated for include a return to fracking shale gas in the UK, scrapping green levies on energy bills, and an increase in North Sea oil and gas production.
In January, Mr Skidmore launched a Net Zero Support Group to counter the arguments being made by Mr Mackinlay's group.
Full story
The London-based Net Zero Watch is a campaign group set up to highlight and discuss the serious implications of expensive and poorly considered climate change policies. The Net Zero Watch newsletter is prepared by Director Dr Benny Peiser - for more information, please visit the website at www.netzerowatch.com.
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