E.ON have announced plans to separate its business into two, sidelining its nuclear and fossil fuel generation assets from its supply and renewable investments. E.ON as we have reported elsewhere are suffering from the German government’s decision to refocus the country to renewable energy at the cost of marginalising existing investment. The planned new company […]
Blackout Threat Gets a Little Brighter
National Grid and the coalition government breathed a collective sigh of relief following the Peterhead folly of late November. RWE’s Littlebrook oil-fired power plant, one of the three plants ring-fenced for the Supplemental Balancing Reserve (SBR) contract to keep the lights on this winter, completed its first standby test successfully. After the fundamental failure of […]
Big 6 Electricity Market Domination Continues
The latest Business energy supplier market share survey, compiled on a quarterly basis by industry consultant Cornwall Energy, has revealed the stark contrast between the competitive landscapes in the gas and electricity markets. The Big 6 still, 20 years after the opening of competition account for nearly 80% of the business electricity market with the Big 6 […]
Nuclear Engineer Shortages Threaten New Nuclear
The Royal Academy of Engineering has revealed that by 2020 the UK requires 830,000 graduates in science, technology, engineering and maths yet UK universities currently produce just 23,000 engineering graduates a year. This shortfall is having a very real impact on the ability for the UK to deliver on its ambitious engineering goals over the […]
Ineos’ Portents of Doom for UK Energy Market
Highlighting the laggard status of UK shale Ineos boss Jim Ratcliffe has claimed: “America has drilled 1.1m wells; the UK has drilled one, and that wasn’t drilled very well”. However Ineos’ hoped for UK shale revolution focussed on the North of England and Scotland has taken a pounding from the results of a YouGov poll […]
Who Controls the Energy Management in your Business?
According to Lord Redesdale, Chief Executive of the Energy Managers Association (EMA) in a recent interview with Utility Week it could and should be the IT department of your business. Redesdale explained: “Energy efficiency is the big one [focus]. We waste about 40 per cent of the energy we put into the system through doing […]
The Independent’s Investigation into Foreign Ownership
In a new investigation, the Independent newspaper has revealed the extent of the displacement of dividends to other European governments as a result of the increasing level of foreign ownership amongst UK utilities. The Independent revealed that: “In the past two years alone, overseas taxpayers have taken dividends totalling nearly £1bn from companies which make […]
The spectre of Schröder haunting the German energy giants
Energiewende The thud of jaws hitting the ground would probably have been audible across the channel when Germany, fresh from their energy giant crippling nuclear moratorium and the cries of despair from RWE and E.ON, Germany has announced that under their policy of ‘Energiewende’ it intends to derive 80% of its electricity from renewable sources […]
Ineos’ New Fracking Frontier
A new frontier has opened in fracking. Scotland and North England can look forward to the drilling of ‘hundreds’ of wells according to intentions revealed by Ineos. The petrochemicals giant announced their potential $1bn investment after bidding for a series of ‘exploration blocks’ in the current DECC licensing round. Success in their bids would see […]
Centrica’s Back of the Sofa Moment
Beleaguered Big 6 energy supplier Centrica like a desperate householder searching down the back of the sofa for spare change is hurriedly looking for exit opportunities from some its less economic generation portfolio. Fresh from its second profit warning in 12 months Centrica is looking to dispose of its Langage, South Humber Bank and Killinghome […]