By Paul Homewood

From the BBC’s Newsround, the kiddies’ news channel:

For the first time, renewable energy overtook fossil fuels to be the biggest source of electricity in the UK in 2020.

Wind, solar, bio-energy and hydro (water) power generated a record 42% of UK power last year, while fossil fuels – mostly gas – produced 41%, according to a report by energy experts Ember and Agora Energiewende.

In 2019, renewables generated 37% of the UK’s electricity, compared with 45% for fossil fuels.

Using renewables – often called ‘green energy’ – is better for the environment as it doesn’t produce the same levels of emissions that can lead to climate change as using fossil fuels and it also doesn’t use up the Earth’s resources in the same way.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/55839613

For some reason the BBC forgot to mention the immense cost of all this:

2.7 Environmental levies
	£ billion
	Outturn	Forecast
	2019-20	2020-21	2021-22	2022-23	2023-24	2024-25	2025-26
CRC Energy Efficiency scheme	0.3	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
Renewables obligation	6.1	6.0	6.4	6.5	6.6	6.8	7.0
Contracts for difference	1.6	2.4	2.9	3.0	3.3	3.1	3.2
Capacity market1	0.0	1.1	0.9	0.5	0.7	0.9	0.9
Green gas levy	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.1	0.1	0.1
Environmental levies	8.0	9.6	10.2	10.0	10.6	10.8	11.3
Memo: Expenditure on renewable heat incentive (RHI)	0.9	1.0	1.1	1.1	1.1	1.1	1.1
Memo: Feed in Tariffs	1.5	1.6	1.6	1.6	1.7	1.7	1.7
Total Subsidy	10.4	12.2	12.9	12.6	13.4	13.6	14.1
Note: The ‘Environmental levies’ line above is consistent with the ‘Environmental levies’ line in Table 3.3 of the November 2020 Economic and fiscal outlook.
1 The ONS have yet to include capacity market auctions in their outturn numbers. If they were included, they would have been £1.7bn.

OBR Fiscal Outlook

This year, the cost of subsidising renewable energy will be £12.9bn, about £470 for every home in the country.

The headline in any event fails to tell the whole story. Wind and solar power only contributed 28% of electricity, with most of the rest coming from burning forests, which I doubt the BBC’s young viewers would find very “green”.

More to the point though, fossil fuels still account for 79% of total energy consumption, with renewables running at just 11%:

https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/digest-of-uk-energy-statistics-dukes-2019

via NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT

https://ift.tt/36mkP1N

January 29, 2021 at 05:18AM