Much has been made recently about the potential for electric vehicles (“EVs”) to transform transport and related industries, even going as far as to suggest that demand for oil is close to peaking as EVs displace petrol and diesel vehicles. According to a recent IEA report: “EVs of all types lie at the heart of…
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One of the downsides of the proliferation of smart devices is the seemingly greater proliferation of charging devices. Go on holiday, and one of the first questions is whether sufficient chargers (and adaptors) have been packed for all the phones, tablets, cameras, laptops, e-readers, gaming devices and so on, so it’s not surprising that wireless…
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Explosion of data in the energy industry Big data is everywhere in today’s energy industry and it’s getting bigger. To most people, energy data is about consumption metrics, however data is changing the market in all parts of the value chain. Generators use market data to optimise their dispatch, ramping flexible assets up and down…
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A significant energy innovation in recent years has been the emergence of electric vehicles (“EVs”), however one of the challenges inhibiting their mass deployment relates to the lack of charging points – 33% of households in outer London have no access to off-street parking to charge an EV, rising to 46% in inner London. Innovations in smart…
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Once upon a time we heated our homes and cooked by burning wood we had gathered and chopped ourselves. Later more energy efficient coal was delivered directly to our cellars via small trapdoors at street level. Later yet dirty coal was replaced by cleaner gas, piped to our homes, and/or electricity brought by wires. Instead…
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Last week saw the publication of Stephen Hendry’s long awaited report into the prospects for tidal energy in the UK, and the hyperbole in the press has been interesting to observe. In his report, Hendry concludes: “I believe that the evidence is clear that tidal lagoons can play a cost effective role in the UK’s…
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2017 could see further interesting and potentially dramatic changes to the UK energy market. In this post I explore some of the key themes for the coming year. # Creation of an Independent System Operator Throughout 2016 pressure was growing for the UK to explore adopting an independent system operator model, with a report from…
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Energy policy is frequently described in terms of the “trilemma”: decarbonisation, security of supply and affordability. Delivering this three-pointed objective requires a three-pointed approach: technological, policy and financial innovation. None of these in isolation can deliver the energy policy objectives. Technological innovation delivers new possibilities for the energy system The impact of technological innovation…
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The past few days have seen Tempus Energy surrendering its supply licence in order to focus purely on wholesale market trading, and Tidal Energy, the Welsh tidal stream technology company go into administration. Analysis by the Financial Times indicates that even in mature segments of the energy sector, in particular end-user supply, new entrants struggle…
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In this second post on the viability of solar + storage (first post here) I examine the conclusions of the Aurora Energy report, which presents a rather more optimistic view of the prospects of the combined technologies, claiming that the cost of backing up solar generation and integrating it into the energy system was negligible,…
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