Monday
Mar102014
by 
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill Policy incoherence
Mar 10, 2014 Climate: Parliament Conservatives The incoherence of coalition energy policy has been clear for a long time and proof continues to pile up. In the Telegraph today, we read that the Treasury is going to extend its scheme for energy intensive industry, giving them further relief from the burdens that are driving them out of business.
The energy and business minister will admit that costs are undermining the UK’s competitiveness and that current compensation for manufacturers is failing to offset the growing burden of green levies on energy bills.
It is hard to contain one's contempt for such awe-inspiring numptiness.
Reader Comments (23)
We have had this mind-numbing idiocy for about twenty years. There were about a dozen Labour Energy Ministers, ending with Miliband, then Huhne and Davey. Of course, it is not just the Energy Ministers and the PMs who are behind it, it is also the Chief Scientific Advisors and the DECC bureaucrats who are determined to drive the country back to the pre-industrial revolution era. There has been nobody with any engineering competence involved in decisions about our electricity supply industry for nigh on twenty years. Subsidising intermittent, unreliable and expensive renewable electricity is destroying wealth on a massive scale.
We lost our nuclear capability when Brown sold off Westinghouse to the Japs for a song. We need shale gas and coal and several new power stations very urgently.
What will we get? Nothing, because of Milibands's Climate Change Act 2009 and his marvellous plan to freeze electricity prices and thereby stop all investment in reliable electricity capacity.
Couldn't have put it better, Philip. We need a popular revolution to take back power (in both senses) from the Marxist EU apparatchiks in Brussels and in London.
I reckon we are only being allowed to contemplate this because it is what Germany does. Another example of how we don't think for ourselves any more.
However, the German policy itself may also be in trouble: "With a new government just in place in Germany, the EU commission on Wednesday announced an investigation into exemptions of heavy industry from green energy charges. Around 2,000 German heavy energy users may have to pay back discounts totalling some €5bn a year, if Brussels finds a distortion of competition." (19 .12.13)
http://euobserver.com/tickers/122549
I am sure some Green person with an English degree will come along and tell us all we need is a lot more wind farms. That's the ticket!
I am sure our "illustrious" Met Office will come along and tell us we are all doomed since the heat hidding in the ocean will eventually get.* Their "scientists" with their models on supercomputers have proved it. If only the Met Office had even more powerful computers what wonders they could do. Proving CO2 is responsible for the sunspots? CO2 causes Earthquakes?
Better off with a real scientist using an abacus!
[*out? BH]
It is all part of the astonishing political panic created by the climate alarm campaigners. How else to describe the bizarre and destructive Climate Change Act being supported by nearly every MP in the House? The 'as night follows day' obviousness that energy costs would rise, competitiveness would fall, renewables would damage the stability of the grid, degrade landscapes, and degrade farmers anywhere whose crops were diverted into fuel tanks rather than bellies.
Phillip Bratby.
What are your pejoratives for people from China, India or Africa?
Brown certainly sold the UK's birthright. I doubt that Japan (or any other nation else) learned much from Westinghouse. The wheel has turned, and its not looking good for Europe.
Re: Hector Pascal
If Japs is a pejorative term for the Japanese does that mean that Scots is a pejorative term for Scottish?
Who decides what is a pejorative term and what is simply a contraction?
I dispute that the policy is 'incoherent'.
Stupid, yes, but deliberate.
For supporters of CO2 consensus the key task seems to be getting an agreement that CAGW is going to happen. Job done. After that, any amount of inconsistent behaviour is ok. Green energy isn't meant to be a real alternative to fossil fuels, it appears to be just a sacrifice to the gods of AGW who will then save us from climate armageddon. Like the ancient religions, it's always the little people who have to suffer for the greater good.
Seriously. We are seeing the effects of different ministers realising renewables are rubbish and they don't want to be the leaders of a green suicide pact. Unfortunately there are still key numpties in power who believe every lie the renewables industry feeds them.
Mar 10, 2014 at 10:12 AM | Unregistered CommenterBarbara
And the recent EU high court ruling that germany must pay their own feed in tariff rate when buying energy from other EU countries. Now that is going to hurt.
Terry, whether or not a term is pejorative depends on prior usage. Jap was used extensively in a negative way in WWII and still has a negative connotation. Scots used to be a proud name. Now the SNP is turning it into a word for intentionally self destructive IMHO ...
TerryS
The Declaration of Arbroath (6th April 1320) says:
So the Scots always called themselves Scots, whereas I'm not sure about the Japanese. On the other hand people often innocently use the language of their childhood which is often jumped on as being unacceptable these days. The method of correction of perceived insult to ones friends and colleagues, might on reflection seem a little harsh.
Policy incoherence?
I see it as Policy Incontinence.
That was my thought. Back in his day, Tony Blair was probably convinced by some that we were going to Bank-ourselves-richer (which hasn't turned out too well), or create wealth simply by re-selling houses to each other at ever increasing prices.
An FT article on Google's power use reveals that it is not trivial. Even they have been led to believe that the fraction of their electricity coming from wind farms will become cheaper over time. I wonder how that is going?
I also entertain some skepticism that they can be significantly more efficient that other search providers [the power of some good accountants?].
Meantime, I expect that when the wind doesn't blow, their server farms will be able to run for days at a time on elastic bands and hamster-wheels.....
I agree with Phillip Bratby.
POI. There is nothing wrong with the term Jap, neither is there anything wrong with the term Nip! It is short for Nippon & Nipponese, which is "Japanese" for Japan & Japanese respectively. My 1967 Yamaha FG140 acoustic guitar will attest to that!!! Those made in Japan with the red label Nippon Gakki being well priced on Ebay UK. After all the French call us Roastbeefs, the American's call us Brits, the Aussies call us Poms. The Scots actually came from Ireland by settlement & invasion, into the land of the Picts! Perhaps that's what the SNP would have us refer to those natives north of the border?
I don't mind people calling me a Brit or a pommie or an Anglo or whatever. I have nothing against the Japanese, I have good friends over there.
“Why, sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.”
― Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland
Sort of sums up our current energy/climate change/support for industry/employment as practised by our "Leaders"- past and present.
This evening's BBC1 programme "Bang Goes the Theory" about the National Grid shows the shallowness of what is communicated by the BBC to the public about our future electricity supply. It was all about the necessity for "carbon reduction" and how we are not going to achieve it. There was no mention of the future costs of electricity from the renewables and the costs of attempting to store vast amounts of intermittent energy generated forn the wind and solar. You might have thought somebody on the programme would have looked at MacKay's book "Sustainable Energy withouit the Hot Air". But no, they trot out the usual nonsense and even have some numpty from RenewableUK telling us how we can link all wind turbines together across Europe. You might have thought thst as they were in the National Grid control centre they might have asked what is going to happen in a couple of years time when demand exceeds supply, but they missed the opportunity.
If this is our future, then this country is truly doomed
Subsidising energy for heavy industry in Germany (at the taxpayers' expense of course) has kept this last remaining solvent eurozone country out of bankruptcy. It's about to end as I understand it. Pity the Germans. Be afraid of the consequences.
WUWT, weekly roundup from SEPP has a link to the Breakthrough Institute which gives figures for German renewables 2012 of 17% and 11% of nameplate capacity for wind and solar respectively. Good article.
BTW I don't mind being called a Taff or even 'that Taffy bas***d' which was quite common when I played rugby in Northern Queensland - a term of respect and endearment!
Whatever happened to "sticks and stones may break my bones but names will never hurt me".
I thought John Hutton was at least better than the other ministerial idiots. But he only lasted a week or so after his speech to the Labour Conference along the lines that reliable and affordable energy was important!
It will be very interesting to watch developments in Germany over the next few years, as they seem to be mostly driving the EU bus these days. It seems clear that Merkel and at least some of her Ministers realise that their "green" policies are putting them on the road to oblivion. At the same time, they don't want to admit to the electorate that they have screwed up royally.
Josh's "pretzel logic" cartoon of Mann will have nothing on the contortions that they face in future.
In the meantime, back in the real world..
As I write, wind providing 0.83% of (modest) electricity demand...
Such good value, those windymills...