Ed Davey is conniving so-and-so on low carbon energy
SO. Here we have Ed Davey, the third runner up in a Wayne Rooney lookalike competition, telling us how all that work they’ve done on renewables is going to save us money:
But my Department has been concentrating on keeping bills as low as possible over the long-term – and for everyone.
Some people think climate change policies on things like wind farms are what are behind high bills. But they couldn’t be more wrong. The biggest single thing driving bills higher is global oil and gas prices. They have been rising remorselessly, fuelled by demand in growing economies like China. They’re likely to keep rising.
The Government can’t control the global market and drive down international wholesale prices. What we can do is try to drive a wedge between global prices and the cost of bills.
Through investment in domestic sources of low carbon energy like nuclear, wind and wave power, and other renewables, we are helping to insulate the public from volatile fossil fuel prices in the future.
This just doesn’t pass the smell test. Given that electricity from solar or wind is more expensive than electricity from gas (we don’t actually make any from oil) It just cannot be possible that having more wind and solar is cheaper than making it from gas.
So, where is the lie then? As the FT reports, it’s here:
The UK’s Department of Energy and Climate Change is about to publish forecasts suggesting that gas prices could rise by up to 70 per cent over the next five years. This is scaremongering nonsense, and shows just how out of touch the Department is with the realities of the international energy market. Officials appear not to have consulted the industry or the traders. In reality the odds are that prices are just as likely to fall as to rise for three distinct reasons.
Yes, that’s right. Davey and his crew are simply assuming that gas prices are going to roar ahead in the future. And thus we’ll all save money because in the future gas will be more expensive than wind or solar.
But Gazprom is losing the fight to keep gas prices tied to the price of oil, meaning that gas prices are likely to fall. Shale gas is coming in this and other European countries. And even if it doesn’t then the US is going to start exporting the flood of the stuff they’ve got.
And, of course, now that we’ve got all these bloody renewables at vast expense, demand for gas is falling.
Yes, of course Davey is lying. He’s a politician and his lips are moving. But at least we know now exactly what he is lying about, don’t we?
Posted: 27th, March 2013 | In: Money Comment | TrackBack | Permalink
