Is the Government being honest about the cost of energy?

rogerblack

Or doing the numbers accurately - not £260:£2, but £1.20:£2 in favour of nuclear.
The figure of £2 mentioned in the original article is inaccurate - note the date.
FIT has gotten considerably larger during that time, due to the large installed base.

Neglecting that fact, and considering figures as of the date of the article.
As of that date, there was 400MW of solar-pv installed.
And around 10GW of nuclear - so the 130:1 (260/2) disparity in funding - once you take into account the peak size of each source - becomes 5:1.
Or 5 pounds subsidy for nuclear per pound of solar.
BUT.
Taking an optimistic 1000kWh/kWp for solar gives a real average output of about a ninth of the peak value. (it might approach a third in the Sahara)
So, for a given amount of electricity, the subsidy looks not like 260:2 - but 5:9.
In short - solar gets more subsidy per kilowatt-hour.

(On the numbers in the original report, and the DECC figures for deployed solar in nov 2011)

Martyn1981

John_Pierpoint wrote: »

Anyway the technique for guaranteeing the profitability of the nuclear power stations which the government can no longer afford to build itself, is "Contract for Difference".

Is anyone able to translate this into something understandable to ordinary people?

Not sure I can translate anything, but this article estimates the difference at about 6 to 9p /kWh:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/blog/2012/may/04/expense-nuclear-power-energy-coalition?intcmp=122

Note: Insurance and de-commissioning costs are not included in that subsidy estimate, they are additional.

Mart.

spgsc531

rogerblack wrote: »

Or doing the numbers accurately - not £260:£2, but £260:£468 in favour of nuclear.
The figure of £2 mentioned in the original article is inaccurate - note the date.
FIT has gotten considerably larger during that time, due to the large installed base.

Neglecting that fact, and considering figures as of the date of the article.
As of that date, there was 400MW of solar-pv installed.
And around 10GW of nuclear - so the 130:1 (260/2) disparity in funding - once you take into account the peak size of each source - becomes 5:1.
Or 5 pounds subsidy for nuclear per pound of solar.
BUT.
Taking an optimistic 1000kWh/kWp for solar gives a real average output of about a ninth of the peak value. (it might approach a third in the Sahara)
So, for a given amount of electricity, the subsidy looks not like 260:2 - but 5:9.
In short - solar gets more subsidy per kilowatt-hour.

(On the numbers in the original report, and the DECC figures for deployed solar in nov 2011)

Really?? £468 a year paid by households for Solar PV???

Evidence?

distinctd

The words "government" and "honest" don't belong in the same sentence

Nuclear energy is not the way to go. The energy consumption of people in general needs to be reduced, we simply don't need this much stuff.

EricMears

spgsc531 wrote: »

Really?? £468 a year paid by households for Solar PV???

Evidence?

Have to agree that sounds unlikely.

My total annual bill isn't much more than that these days or taking away the solar panels & other economy measures it would still be less than £1000. I would have said we were above average in electricity use.

Has the renewables surcharge suddenly gone up to 50% and nobody told me ?

rogerblack

spgsc531 wrote: »

Really?? £468 a year paid by households for Solar PV???

Evidence?

Ok, I should have on reflection edited it to be £1.20:£2 instead.

(For the same amount of electricity)

Martyn1981

Hiya Roger, aren't you oversimplifying it though, since the higher PV subsidy is time limited, only on a smallish amount of generation, and is primarily to launch the product and reduce it's subsidy impact?

The nuclear subsidies 6p to 9p (if that article is correct) is simply to allow the industry to carry on operating, and is paid on all generation.

As PV generation grows, the subsidy itself continues to fall. I've suggested recently that PV and nuclear subsidies look about the same already:-

16p for PV for 20 years
6p/9p for nuclear for life
both should generate for approx 40 years.

That PV subsidy could well be down to 6p/9p in the next few years.

If (big if!) PV gets to say 10% of UK annual demand, or about half the size nuclear was at, and the government is aiming for again, then it's subsidy both in cost per kWh, and total cost in £'s will be far less than nuclear.

Then add in de-commissioning costs, which if divided solely into households, works out at about £90pa and nuclear is getting seriously expensive, or rather, is being revealed as seriously expensive as this has been going on now for 50 years.

Mart.

spgsc531

rogerblack wrote: »

Ok, I should have on reflection edited it to be £1.20:£2 instead.

(For the same amount of electricity)

On reflection you shouldn't have posted that post at all, or deleted it.

After correcting the first glaring error that I pointed out, it's still a load of garbage.

rogerblack

spgsc531 wrote: »

On reflection you shouldn't have posted that post at all, or deleted it.

After correcting the first glaring error that I pointed out, it's still a load of garbage.

In what way?
Is it reasonable to quote that nuclear costs £260, while solar costs £2, without noting at all that the relative production makes £2 more expensive?

spgsc531

rogerblack wrote: »

In what way?
Is it reasonable to quote that nuclear costs £260, while solar costs £2, without noting at all that the relative production makes £2 more expensive?

Ok, lets look at that then...

The OP link quotes £6.93bn given to the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority in 2011, there are 22m households in the UK? I make that £315 per household? Simple enough maths but let's stick with your £260...

Not sure the accuracy of £2 for solar PV but sounds reasonable considering DECC announced total green taxes 2010-11 was £20 per household.

Nuclear 16.6% of total generation 2011
Solar PV 0.64% of total generation 2011

0.64% cost £2
16.6% cost £260 (£315 really)

0.64 goes into 16.6 by 25.9375 times

£2 x 25.9375 = £51.875

£260 (£315 really) divided by £51.875 = 5.01

Think the figures are correct as far as I can tell. Pretty simple maths to work out....

Therefore Solar PV is over 500% more cost effective than Nuclear?

This, of course, ignores post 18 which points out other reasons why your post was full of garbage.