News Article

UK breaks coal free energy record again but renewables still need more support

power plant

LONDON -

Today is the fourth the UK has entered with not a watt of electricity generated by coal.

It’s the longest such streak since the 1880s and comes only days after the last modern era record of 55 hours was set.

That represents good news for those of us who have children and would rather like there to be a planet for them to live on when we’re gone.

Coal generated power is dirty power, and not just through the carbon that gets pumped into the atmosphere when it burns.

The fact that the UK is increasingly able to call upon cleaner alternatives for its requirements, to the extent that records are being regularly broken, is a welcome development.

The trouble is one of those alternatives is gas, and while it is better than coal it still throws off CO2, among other pollutants. The UK’s use of it, for electricity generation and most of its heating, comes with the added disadvantage of leaving it in hock to volatile international markets and producers that aren’t always friendly.

It was only last month, with the country in the middle of a cold snap, that the Grid was issuing a deficit warning (its first in eight years).

As I wrote at the time, we need to burn less of the stuff.

As such, Greenpeace’s call for more investment in renewable energy technology and generation, including solar, onshore wind and offshore wind, which is making an increasing contribution, was well made.

Those who complain about onshore wind farms, particularly when they are built in windy places that are pretty, seem willfully blind to the pollution caused by gas.

The need to be listened to less. So do those, like British Gas owner Centrica, that bellyache about green taxes.

It bears repeating that fossil fuels are subsidised still more. It’s just that the subsidies are typically hidden.

A report issued last year by a coalition of environmental organisations found the UK provided $972m (£695m) of annual financing for fossil fuels on average between 2013 and 2015, compared with $172m for renewable energy.

But while they come up with wildly varying amounts as a result of wildly varying approaches, the OECD, the IMF and the International Energy Agency have all quantified substantial subsidies for fossils fuels. Their annual estimates have ranged from $160bn to $5.3tn (yes you read that rate and the number was the IMF’s) globally.

So by all means celebrate coal free days. But we need more of them more quickly and we need more renewable energy to pick up the slack. As such, the philosophy and approach of government needs to change.

Related News

nuclear plant

Nuclear Innovation Needed for American Energy, Environmental Future

WASHINGTON - The most cost-effective way--indeed the only reasonable way-- to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and foster our national economic and security interests is through innovation, especially nuclear innovation. That's from Rep. Greg Walden, R-Oregon, ranking Republican member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, speaking to a Subcommittee on Energy hearing titled, "Building a 100 Percent Clean Economy: Advanced Nuclear Technology's Role in a Decarbonized Future."

Here are the balance of his remarks.

Encouraging the deployment of nuclear technology, strengthening our nuclear industrial base, implementing policies that helps reassert U.S. nuclear leadership globally... all provide a promising path to meet both…

READ MORE
justin trudeau

Trudeau vows to regulate oil and gas emissions, electric car sales

READ MORE

huawei logo

Egypt, China's Huawei discuss electricity network's transformation to smart grid

READ MORE

California scorns fossil fuel but can't keep the lights on without it

READ MORE

texas snow storm

"It's freakishly cold": Deep freeze slams American energy sector

READ MORE