Peter McCusker Energy & Climate

LABOUR’S plans to freeze energy prices threatens the security of the UK’s energy supply and will hamper the Party’s efforts to de-carbonise the sector. THE UK desperately needs new power generation capacity with EU emissions regulations meaning the on-going closure of the nation’s coal-fired plants and 20GW – or 20% - of capacity. Ofgem and the National Grid worry about the UK’s declining capacity and warn that from the winters of 2014/15 onwards we may face power cuts. The Energy Bill is set to unlock £100 billion of investment in new infrastructure spending. The Government is hoping the energy companies, most of which are producers as well as retailers, will invest in new gas-fired power stations in the short term. But there’s no hope of any of this new large-scale capacity firing up before 2017. Gas would be the quickest to come on line – it takes about 3 years. But the slow progress of the Energy Bill is already alarming investors, as is the prevarication of s...

FRACKING for gas and nuclear power are the answer to the UK’s looming energy crisis, says one of the North East’s foremost energy experts. Peter McCusker reports. WITH the National Grid and Ofgem warning of possible electricity shortages in the coming winters there is growing unease in North East business. Ian Burdon is chairman of the region’s Energy Leadership Council (ELC) and says its members are increasingly concerned at the direction of UK energy policy and its effects on business and families. He said: “If we continue to use energy in the way we will have to do something different to what we plan to do now. Life cannot continue the way we know it without energy. “The renewable technologies, such as wind, require substantial subsidies and are not of a large enough scale at present. “As things currently stand they will only peck at the edges of meeting the nation’s required demand. While the answer is not acceptable to everyone we have to focus on developing technol...