As if the development of a new generation of power stations to deliver energy to the UK over the coming decades was not precarious enough, the latest news from the Areva, the French nuclear business, could prove the final nail in the coffin of “new nuclear” in the UK. Areva were responsible for the design […]
LNG, The Only Way is Down
It has certainly been a strange few months in the global energy markets. With all the indicators suggesting prices should be rising – uncertainty in unstable markets, the Russia Ukraine conflict, a falling oil price raising the spectre of OPEC driven curtailment of supply and a winter capacity constraint the level of which has been […]
Independent suppliers top B2B satisfaction survey
Datamonitor have released their latest B2B Energy Buyer Customer Satisfaction research. The 2014 report as ever makes interesting reading for those businesses looking for an energy supplier and for the industry itself. Once again smaller, independent suppliers have come out on top with Opus Energy taking the SME crown and Smartest Energy triumphing in the […]
Energy Efficiency and the SME: The Time to Act is Here
The next front in the war on energy costs is getting the UK’s SMEs to take energy efficiency measures seriously as a key plank of their business strategy, that is according to a recent Guardian seminar on business energy costs. Such a proposition is unlikely to be attractive to all but the most committed environmentally aware […]
Centrica’s latest profit warning
There have probably been worse executive teams to sit on in the last 12 months than Centrica’s, but not many. With a revolving door that appeared to only be working one way, outwards. A vocal then chastised Chief Executive. And the advent of the CMA investigation into the energy market with Centrica particularly suffering the […]
November SMI from Ofgem
Supply Market Indicators In our regular monthly review of Ofgem’s Supply Market Indicators we focus on November’s release from the energy regulator. Last month’s figures are in brackets. November 2014 The November 2014 SMI from Ofgem reported that: – They estimate that the average annual dual fuel bill has once again fallen slightly for the next 12 months to […]
Comparethemarket Highlights Energy Market Differences
According to ‘revelatory’ data from Comparethemarket, the most popular energy tariffs in the domestic market include names “You might not have heard about”. They report that: Extra Energy attracted fully 36.28% of domestic energy switches in October First Utility 11.65% E.ON 10.82% nPower 9.18% Sainsbury’s Energy 7.44% Whilst the biggest losses were felt by: nPower […]
Ofgem (TPI) Working Group Nov-14
The Ofgem Third party intermediary (TPI) working group met for their 3rd session on the 7th November 2014. The session brought further clarity to the future arrangements for a TPI “code”, however it was disappointing to hear that this is the final gathering of the grouping despite significant issues yet to be resolved. Below we summarise the key ‘outcomes’ […]
European Chambers calls for SME Lending Revolution
The populist rhetoric of EU baiters often falls on deaf ears for UK SME’s. After all we are savvy enough to know the benefit of such a key export market and the lessons we can learn from the continent’s approach to business for instance Germany’s concept of the ‘Mittelstand’. But at times it is difficult […]
The Rise of the Super-SME
According to UK fund management firm Octopus Investments there is a new super hero in town, this one though doesn’t wear a cape or a mask and its only super power appears to be recruitment excellence. A recent report from Octopus has revealed that just 1% of the UKs businesses created a astonishing 68% of […]