By Jo Nova
If the UK had kept the old gas policy, skipped “renewables” — they’d be £220 billion better off
Since there are 67 million Britons, that means every man, woman and child would be £3,283 richer today. For a family of four that’s £13,000 of savings spread over 20 years.
Kathryn Porter has painstakingly unpacked the bureaucratic polyglot to add up the ghastly bill, and published “The true affordability of net zero”
“..had Britain continued with its legacy gas-based power system in the period since 2006, consumers would have been almost £220 billion better off (2025 money) even taking into account the impact of the gas crisis.“
Even if the fuel is free, every other thing about collecting, storing and distributing “free energy” is very expensive.
Ed Milliband might blame fossil fuels for the train-wreck that is UK electricity — but the prices have been rising in the UK ever since vainglorious politicians first dreamt of fiddling with the weather. In the UK, even though wholesale prices remained the same largely, all the other costs of renewables snuck in to household prices to inflate them like the Hindenburg.
Renewables “profits” come from trickery, deceit and subsidy lies, and not from a free market in electricity
Firstly they lied that wind and solar would be cheaper, then they lied that the subsidies were temporary. Instead the subsidies are still growing 35 years after they started. Last year the total cost of UK levies was £17.2 billion. These renewable subsidies were buried under boring anesthetic labels like “contracts for difference”, “capacity market” or the “CRC Energy Efficiency Scheme”.
Look at the rainbow cluster of levies in the graph below, and their growth in the last decade. If wind and solar were actually cheaper, or even just competitive, environmental levies would be “zero”. If wind and solar were getting more effective, the subsidies would be falling, not rising.
And if those levies had honest names they’d be called “Climate Changing Slush Fund”, or “Forced Renewable Support Fee”. The Contracts for Difference would be the “Guaranteed Profits for Windpower Levy”.
The Renewables Obligation levy could be the Banker Support Fund, or perhaps “Foreign Aid for China”.
Ed Miliband’s net zero crusade is adding billions to Britons’ energy bills
By Johnathon Leake, The Telegraph:
According to analysis by consultant Kathryn Porter, green levies on energy bills will hit £20bn by the end of the decade. Staggeringly, this is up from £5bn in 2014, as the vast cost of Miliband’s radical clean energy ambitions rapidly adds up.
As part of Porter’s report into green levies, The True Affordability of Net Zero, she claims the renewables obligation scheme – which is responsible for supporting wind farm construction – is alone adding £7.8bn a year to power bills. That is despite it being closed to new entrants seven years ago. Its successor, the Contracts for Difference scheme (CfD), is adding another £2.3bn, she says.
Kathryn Porter points out that there are 10 levies that are added quietly to electricity bills, rather than being an honest tax. (It’s the same here in Australia).
“If this money was being raised through taxation, it would be scrutinised by the Treasury, the Office for Budget Responsibility, and by voters at general elections,” says Porter.
“But instead, Miliband is taking these subsidies from the pockets of consumers and giving them to renewable generators – without ever having had to win approval for the idea in an election.
These are forced payments from customers who get no choice, and which are hidden in their bills, disguised by lying labels in public announcements, and which are fed through electricity retailers to corporations.
Except for extremely rare circumstances, everything about renewable energy only profits because of State force, deception and trickery.
Read it all: Kathryn Porter: The true affordability of net zero
Replace the word renewables with profiteering, as shown in your graph, and the story makes sense.
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Yes, the unreliables crowd are profiteering off the taxpayer.
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Renewables ARE profiteering. De Facto.
Renewables are subsidized in construction, operation, transmission, and dispatch.
Renewables do not pay for transmission construction or maintenance.
Renewables do not pay for their decommissioning or disposal costs.
Renewables burden the costs of thermal power but bear no costs for that burden.
Peter, if profiteering is the issue, then the comparative standard is the subsidized profits of the renewables industry. Renewables wouldn’t exist without graft/grift/profiteering.
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In fact renewables make TWICE as much from subsidies as sales:
https://www.hepburnenergy.coop/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/FY16_Hepburn-Wind-Annual-Report-.pdf
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The Grantham Research Institute has already shot this report down, gas has had far higher subsidies. Also KP gets the bulk of her income from the fossil fuel industry —- follow the money , as Jo loves to say .
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A search for “Grantham Research Institute kathryn porter affordability of net zero” finds no such report.
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No, it’s KP’s report . Globally, fossils have always been massively subsidized.
Are you OK with Kathryn’s income stream conflict ?, Alan Jones style ( bless him ) cash for comment .
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Pure empty bluff Miasma. If you abuse the English language, and call a tax deduction a “subsidy” (like https://www.stopclimatechaos.scot/manifesto/policy/remove-fossil-fuel-subsidies/), it’s just another example of how all you have is lies and ad hom slurs. The other payments to keep gas plants running are only necessary because of the renewable subsidies that drive them out of business. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-02-28/uk-subsidies-for-fossil-fuel-power-plants-swell-to-record
All over the world people buy gas voluntarily because they value it. Almost no one freely buys wind and solar without forced payments from other people.
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Of course a tax break is a subsidy, otherwise it’s income, what an abuse of logic.
What ad hominem slur are you talking about ?, Peter was right ..
What happened to the great search for evidence against AGW ?, this is just a side show because you have no evidence.
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Then not taxing the air you breathe must be a subsidy. Yeh, we are a generous lot, don’t ye think?
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The gas market is not free. It is corrupted like the rest.
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Renewable energy is similar to vaccines.
A random individual may not be ‘better off’, but other not random individuals will.
The thing that needs to be subsidized is not making random individuals better off, but rather to provide moral ideological affirmation to not random individuals.
There is no intention save the climate or grandmas, but to affirm climate and grandma saving.
The British public is getting a bargain on virtuousness.
The purpose of government is transfer virtue from the unvirtuous to the virtuous.
And to the unvirtuous that are made virtuous by showing up uninvited.
In the words of the great philosopher David Lee Roth … “it doesn’t matter what you do as long as you look good doing it”.
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I’m glad the truth is finally coming out.
Now we need to do the same for Australia.
Let’s keep fighting.
But expect the Left to fight back – hard. Hence them pushing for more and more censorship and the UK arresting over 12,000 people per year for thoughts expressed on social media.
Let’s keep fighting!
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Great stuff, if only the masses could see this.
One cost not directly mentioned was the de-comissioning of soon to be scrapped “renewables”.
Here in New South Wales the increase in charges was hidden by government which endorsed the separation of the electricity supply into two separate businesses: generation and distribution.
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Yet another subsidy for “renewables” is that the huge concrete foundation windmills are built on is never required to be removed. Thus the land is permanently degraded. It would be hugely costly to remove should they be required to do so, and is just another subsidy.
How much do you think it would cost to remove this lot?
And how much “greenhouse gas” (sic) was produced making and transporting the foundation materials? Will they ever be recovered in the short life of the windmill? (Not that CO2 emissions matter.)
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Does the “service life” apply to the blades, the generators or the towers?
How many brolgas, bustards or pelicans can a blade chop before it needs replacing?
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DM
One long term somewhat benefit – you can bet that the concrete will not be up to Roman standards so won’t be lasting thousands of years
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Even if the masses did see it would they understand or accept it. They have been subject to a continual, unrelenting media blitz for 20 years about the climate crisis and it’s only solution: renewables. Trump is leading a damming of this hideous propaganda overseas but meeting stupid, stiff resistance. Here there is marginal resistance but the main political parties, the media and bureaucracy are pushing this destructive garbage. It is not an understatement that Australia is going over a cliff. Blackout’s maniacal renewables Blitzkrieg will inevitably lead to blackouts and economic ruination.
What can be done. The first immediate thing is a sympathetic billionaire has to buy a major media outlet so sensible bloggers like Jo can get a bigger voice. Where are you Gina?
Of note the leader of the greens, Larissa Waters has come out today and blamed the floods on the East coast on global boiling. We are currently in a La Niña dominated period or a +ve PDO where La Niña dominates. There was a similar period during the 1940-1976 period and thereafter a -ve PDO when El Nino dominated. A good article on what happened during the previous +ve PDO period is here:
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-11-27/australian-floods-1950s-same-weather-forces-record-rains/101694992
Naturally alarmists like Waters ignores this and continue to peddle their disgraceful lie.
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When we had some dry years they were busy blaming that on Global Warming. They predicted it was going to keep getting drier and drier.
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East Coast Trend Pamphlet
You can keep a copy of that one … the little note says it was from 2015 but the graphics suggest they were drawn up 2005.
Note the “consensus” prediction was all for warmer and drier … but also they gave themselves a massive upper and lower range, far broader then any of the past data. They had no idea what it would do.
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I suspect this analysis understates the real cost of renewables on taxpayers by not making an assessment of the loss of industries to other countries such as China who dont have industry shackled by renewables. Those losses are taxes from those companies and job losses which result in a higher unemployment benefits bill. On top of that is the impact of higher electricity prices on inflation and the indirect and opportunity costs just keep adding up. Looking at the financial consequences of subsidies and climate schemes only tells you part of the story. However bad you think it is it is a lot worse.
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True but you have to start slowly on these things by just showing how much we are being screwed on electricity bills. As for the damage done to the economy and employment by these costs, a third pottery company in Stoke on Trent has closed down in the last few months with energy costs playing their part.
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ITS TIME TO GET RID OF THE ENERGY THIEVES, THE POWER PARASITES!
Katherine Porter’s work on the cost of unreliable energy in Britain is a major contribution to the Schernikau and Smith program to reveal the Full Cost of the subsidised and mandated energy thieves. They show how the wind and solar industries survive as parasites feeding on the energy generated by more efficient conventional power sources.
Katherine Porter https://lnkd.in/e-AESx-E
Schernikau and Smith https://rafechampion.substack.com/p/wind-and-solar-the-energy-thieves
Their important book is a fine piece of writing which is unusual these days. It is highly recommended and people who are short of time can get what they need to know from the beautifully illustrated 24-minute video produced to promote the revised edition.
And get moving on the exit from net zero. https://open.substack.com/pub/rafechampion/p/start-planning-to-exit-net-zero
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David M
I guess these massive concrete foundations can be considered to be rock outcrops once the towers are decommissioned. After all the concrete is derived from natural rock types. They would be the strongest foundations ever for a house even though plumbing would be a problem. Great views from high ground as well!
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They are actually buried at about 1 metre below ground level, specifically so that they don’t have to be removed when the tower comes down. Its simply a magicians trick, cover the foundation with dirt and the site has been “rehabilitated” to original condition.
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Sort of like sweeping dirt under the rug.
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A good thing about the UKs energy woes is that OZ can learn from it and not repeat the same mistakes, but alas, we will.
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Thanks Jo have bookmarked amd downloaded 31 Page PDF
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How much more better off would each Australian be if we’d stuck with our coal/gas fired energy system that worked 24/7? Sadly, now we’re faced with energy penury as a result of ‘jumping ship’ for the renewables boondoggle of becoming a third world energy stupid power. But what’s especially galling is that the nongs like Chris Bowen who facilitated our energy debacle will, like many other well off elites, be immune from the fallout of their stupid decisions.
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According to the Melbourne Uni , Uni of Qld and the NOUS Group study the cost of net zero for Australia using solar and wind would be 7 to 9 TRILLION $.
And the full cost of Nuclear would be about 0.115 TRILLION $ and this would easily last until 2100 and provide reliable energy 24/7/365.
Just read the first few paragraphs at the link.
https://reneweconomy.com.au/net-zero-study-finds-australia-needs-nearly-three-terawatts-of-wind-and-solar/#:~:text=Australia%20will%20need%20nearly%20three%20terrawatts%2C%20or%203%2C000,to%20%249%20trillion%2C%20according%20to%20a%20new%20study.
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Unfortunately if you showed this to the average Australian they wouldn’t raise an eyebrow much less join the dots to what is happening here. If only the conservatives had completed such and analysis of the Australian system and taken it to the election, they may have had a better outcome. They seem to be afraid however of offending anybody on this matter
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From Quadrant re: Trot-Labour’s inane renewables policy:
https://quadrant.org.au/news-opinions/energy/amping-up-the-lunacy/
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Porter’s explanation is expanded on by former US Congressman Jason Chaffetz 2022 book ‘The Puppeteers’. This con from big financiers, Soros Foundation and WEF is a bigger minefield than the useful idiots handing over taxpayer subsidies. The DEI & ESG cudgel aimed at corporations to pay ‘fines and reparations’ which ostensibly are to go to individuals defined by the US Department of Justice (fine collector Merrick Garland under Ole Dementia Joe), but get sucked dry by the approved ‘administrators’ of those funds. All done without voters having a say, as Porter says is happening with energy grifts in the UK and we know is happening under Bowen.
Chaffetz talks of the Obama climate con; the E in ESG then moving on to education and the gold plated fundraiser which doesn’t need voter ratification – retirement fund raids. Start with the top end as a trojan horse to work your way thru the lower fund totals until you have to move on to other revenue raising areas which don’t need voter scrutiny. The elected puppets can be bought, forming a uniparty and any dissenters get the full Marxist character assassination.
Trump saw this in 2015 and stood because of it. His ego overrode his ability to get the message thru, but 4 years of rallies while ODJ was the puppet honed his message and became understandable to a wider audience of outsiders as they saw the weaponisation of the bureaucracy to circumvent democracy.
The Marxist in the West have been and still are testing policies in different democratic jurisdictions to circumvent the particular differences in systems, but they are all sliding in the same basic money grabs, cherry picking as they go.
Albanese Marxist government has been doing this from day one.
Climate con, taxpayers paying Labor voting junk degree ‘graduates’ fees, now the trojan horse retirement tax.
Some say it’s appropriate that a tax based on make believe future profits will fund make believe global warming, but that tax will push up rental prices on investment properties and farmers self funded super which is asset based.
Time for the people to mobilise. We may not be able to vote it out with a Uniparty swamp, but puppets are still susceptible to shaming them publicly.
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Last year SA Senator Fawcett actually told us the truth about the horrendous cost of toxic W & S and said the full cost by 2050 would be 7 to 9 TRILLION $.
Why wasn’t this mentioned during the election and why did everyone just run and hide. Just unbelievable but true. See the last 2 minutes of his speech.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iXsJItT_vTk
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I think the Telegraph article is wrong to say that Kathryn Porter is ‘claiming’ that the renewables obligation is increasing costs – she is clearly showing they are.
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