Featured Posts
Addressing the high real cost of renewable generation
Over the past few months we have been inundated with claims from interested parties that more renewables are the [...]
Energy security strategy: worryingly vague, worryingly long-term and worryingly still supply focused
Last night the Government announced its much anticipated energy security strategy, with the full version appearing this afternoon. The [...]
Price cap subsidies for every household as default tariff hits record highs
This morning Ofgem has announced a record increase in the level of the default tariff price cap, from £1,277 [...]
Recent Posts
New York REV: a case study in whole system re-design
I have highlighted in recent posts some areas of regulatory reform that are needed in order to deliver the energy transition at the lowest possible cost. This is a complex challenge, so it is interesting to consider the work [...]
Energy efficiency measures should be a no-brainer, so why are businesses so reluctant?
This week I attended an event run by the Energy Institute on whether in the context of the UK’s industrial strategy the policy can keep up with the energy market. One comment that was made repeatedly was that UK [...]
Disruptive innovations in the energy sector
13 April 1892 saw the birth of Robert Watson-Watt, the inventor of radar, and descendant of Scottish inventor James Watt after whom the unit of power was named. Also on this day in 1960 the first satellite navigation system [...]
Finding the right business model for electricity storage
The question of how electricity storage should be treated by regulators is once again in the news, with National Grid and UK Power Networks making submissions to the UK Government setting out their reasons for wanting to be able to [...]
Nuclear power: small steps towards new nuclear in the GB market
The past couple of weeks have seen a stream of news on the topic of nuclear power. In this post I will outline the key developments and what they mean for the GB power market. Hinkley Point construction moves [...]
Solar spurs growth in turn-up DSR
The need for the new Turn-Up DSR service was clearly shown on Saturday 25 March when daytime electricity demand fell below overnight demand for the first time, due to high levels of solar PV generation. According to government data, [...]
Inductive charging: can it deliver a world without wires?
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 [...]
Big Data in Energy: big opportunities and big risks
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 [...]
Why energy price caps are not the way forward
Once again we hear in the news the ominous threats of energy price caps in response to retailers raising their prices, and while the desire of politicians to respond to consumer anger is understandable, this is a temptation they [...]
The shifting sands of the UK gas market
The UK gas market is facing unprecedented changes, with a conflation of declining North Sea production, threats to the UK's gas storage capability, and of course, Brexit. Historically, UK gas came almost entirely from domestic production, with a small amount [...]
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