Planning consent was granted for three new gas power stations with a combined capacity of 4 gigawatts yesterday.
Department of Energy and Climate Change Minister Mike O’Brien consented the power stations proposed in Pembroke, Wales, Kings Lynn, Norfolk and Hatfield, Hertfordshire.
Centrica is to build a 1000 megawatt combined cycle gas turbine (CCGT) power station in Kings Lynn, with RWE npower building a CCGT double the size in Pembroke. The Hatfield proposal by Powerfuel is a 900 megawatt coal gasification gas-fired power station where coal is used to produce hydrogen for fuel.
A condition of granting the planning consents was the reservation of land for future carbon capture and storage plant technology although it is not clear if the technology of the power stations themselves allow for a retrofit.
Despite these consents we are warned by RWE npower CEO that the energy gap is coming closer. In yesterday’s Financial Times he writes “Government and regulators continue to treat the big energy issues in isolation … The drive to set and meet ever more stringent CO2 targets is not integrated with the ministerial push to tackle energy costs and, vitally, the need to ensure security of supply.”
CharlieO
February 11th, 2009
To hear DECC announce this shortly after I heard that the London Array might be set back by a funding scare from Abu-Dhabi-based Masdar, I do wonder why such projects aren’t provided with any sort of stimulus or more prominent UK funding. Surprise, surprise it’s a Danish company, Dong Energy, that is left as about the only reliable funding prospect.
As somebody who writes extensively about wind power, I’d be really interested to hear your perspective on this>?
Vicky Portwain
February 12th, 2009
Hi Charlie
I think that offshore wind financial returns have taken a hit from the drop in the value of the pound and rising steel etc. costs. This would also probably affect power station build in the current climate. However the electricity retailers in the UK need electricity to sell – they have to get it from somewhere and they like a range of sources to reduce the energy supply risk – including offshore wind. The government has tried to help increase the value of the green energy from offshore wind by increasing the ROC in an attempt to make it financially viable – see my article http://www.windenergyplanning.com/wind-energy-questions-renewable-obligation-certificates/. However the really high cost is the grid connection costs and I think that the government and/or Ofgem and the Crown Estate could do more here in terms of 1) speeding up the process of sorting out how all of the involved companies are going to contribute to the new infrastructure and 2) by assisting financially instead of the Crown Estate taking large license fees for exploring the suitability of offshore sites.
In summary – offshore wind will succeed and will be financially sustainable, but I think it will go through a stormy ride on the way – particularly in the current climate and the industry will be dominated by the big utilities like RWE npower who have big bank balances and are prepared to take low financial returns for a (relatively) secure energy supply.
Vicky