Rising geopolitical tensions and dependence on liquefied natural gas make it unlikely that energy costs will return to pre-Ukraine war levels, says Szu Ping Chan in the Telegraph. Here’s an excerpt:
Rachel Reeves will deliver her maiden Budget against a backdrop of rising energy bills and higher inflation.
Typical gas and electricity bills are now forecast to rise by almost £150 a year to £1,714 in October, from the current two-year low of £1,568.
The prediction from energy consultancy Cornwall Insight is one of the most accurate in the industry and comes ahead of the official figure on the price cap from regulator Ofgem at the end of this week.
The expected increase will pile pressure on households this winter, with millions of pensioners already set to miss out on winter fuel payments this year for the first time since Gordon Brown introduced the annual payment of up to £300 in 1997.
Energy will also push up the headline rate of inflation towards 2.7% in the final quarter of this year, according to Bank of England forecasts.
Cornwall Insight believes summer may be as good as it gets when it comes to falling energy prices, with bills unlikely to get within touching distance of their pre-war averages of around £1,200 any time soon.
Craig Lowrey, Principal Consultant at Cornwall Insight, said: “While we don’t expect a return to the extreme prices of recent years, it’s unlikely that bills will return to what was once considered normal. Without significant intervention, this may well be the new normal.”
The U.K. imported roughly 40% of its energy needs in 2023, slightly higher than the previous year. The country has been a net energy importer for about two decades following the end of the North Sea boom in the 1980s and 1990s.
Before the invasion of Ukraine, such reliance was not a major problem as Britain could call upon a cheap and plentiful supply of Russian gas.
However, the decision by the West to turn its back on Russian fuel drove a massive spike in prices in 2022 and sent household bills spiralling.
It also forced the U.K. to seek out alternative supplies: we are now much more reliant on liquefied natural gas (LNG) than a few years ago, accounting for 42% of the U.K.’s gas needs. …
The problem for Britain is that, unlike fixed pipes, the LNG ships are free to go to whichever terminal pays the highest price.
“We’ve basically found ourselves in a bidding war on global gas markets to get the gas that we need,” says Michael Bradshaw, a professor of Global Energy at Warwick Business School. …
It’s not only unpredictable geopolitics that influences our bills.
“The weather is a very large factor,” says Bradshaw. “Because Asia is in the northern hemisphere as well, if we both have cold winters then we’re both competing for the same gas.”
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Apparently the UK could buy Iraq/Iran oil at 50 dollars a barrel – instead of the current 100 dollars a barrel bought from India who buy it from er, Russia.
USA gets some for free by looting Syria.
And massive profits by selling their LPG to the EU – (but just think of all the wonderful CO2 emitted).
Your barking up the wrong tree. We get 50% of our gas from the North Sea and most of the rest from Norway, and the remainder from the USA. America has much lower energy prices than ours because of fracking. We have astronomically high prices because of The Climate Change Act and the pursuit of Net Zero. If you want to understand high prices you must look to our pandering to the UN and it’s Sustainable Development policies that seek to lower the standard of living of the prosperous west because they think our lifestyles are “unsustainable”. The USA mostly resists that but under the Democrats of Obama Biden and Harris if she wins in November, the USA will be drawn more into this Eco Socialism.
Conflicts around the world started by the US have pushed energy prices through the roof for many countries, I’m not just talking about the UK.
You are preaching to the converted when it comes to the bogus climate change debacle and the costs involved.
Please give examples? What conflicts, and were they necessary or not?———Since 2008 when Miliband gave us the Climate Change Act electricity prices have risen 300%. This is due to combination of massive subsidy to renewables paid for on consumers bills and also the link between gas prices and electricity prices since a lot of electricity is produced using gas.
——If I were you I would not give this current eco socialist Labour Government pandering to UN/WEF agenda’s around climate an easy ride by blaming America for the current state of affairs. Our absurd Energy Policies are what are mostly to blame for our current predicament.
Yeah well what about British oil and gas (onshore and offshore) and British coal and British nuclear power? Yeah, let’s blame the Russians. Nothing to do with stupid/evil policy choices going back decades.
Weren’t you, me and tof just talking about this the other week? Ha! Never in a month of Sundays will the people of the North East adhere to such absolute codswallop. These Woketards can haddaway an’ shite! And I don’t know how they’re able to bring sexism into it as ”pet” is very much a unisex word. Honestly, do these people have anything between their lugs or just bubble and squeak?
”Geordies have slammed Newcastle University for urging researchers to bid ‘Auf Wiedersehen, Pet’ after bosses deemed the slang term sexist.
Diversity chiefs labelled the Tyneside lingo ‘patronising’ in an equality and inclusion toolkit issued to researchers.
Their seven-page guide instructs readers to ‘avoid… terms, such as girls, pet, or ladies’ and asks that groups are referred to as ‘friends or colleagues’ instead. The advice appears in a section named ‘Talking about Gender‘ which says: ‘Sexism can often be subtle in conversations, and we can all be guilty of it without realising.’
“And I don’t know how they’re able to bring sexism into it as ”pet” is very much a unisex word.”
I lived in Sunderland for four years. Most of my friends at the time were Mackems, lads and lasses and yes “pet” was unisex. What the numpties fail to understand was that the use of the term “pet” also carried connotations of warmth and friedliness which is and always will be way beyond the cold formalities of friend / colleague. In the North West the equivalent to “pet” would be “love” but it is not quite as warm as “pet.”
“These Woketards can haddaway an’ shite!”
Exactly Mogs. Destroy the language and the culture goes with it.
I cannot compete with the poetry of “haddaway an’ shite!” so firk off will have to do.
I hear on TV news dumb socialists supporting Net Zero absurdity saying “we must do this as we have to avert the climate crisis” and other such utter garbage. We must not do this at all as long as the rest of the world is mostly not doing it, and we certainly should not be doing it at brake neck speed by 2030, which apart from being utterly stupid is absolutely IMPOSSIBE. ——For a start there are about 25 million gas boilers in the UK. In 5 and a quarte years from now anyone who thinks we can replace all of those with heat pumps needs certified, and the first person in the mental ward should be Miliband.
But we do not get our gas from Russia. That only accounted for 3% of our gas. 50% comes from our own reserves in the North Sea, which our silly governments want to stop, and the majority of the rest comes from Norway and then the USA.
——I suspect that what will happen with this Labour Eco Fundamentalist Government is that all of the renewable subsidies that have been in the past added to our electric bills will now be added to gas bills instead so as to encourage us away from gas and coerce us into getting heat pumps. This is going to make gas prices very high and people very cold, especially the poorest and pensioners stripped of their winter fuel allowance. ——It is a bare face lie that Labour tell when they say they will make energy prices lower, and another bare faced lie when they say renewables are now cheaper than fossil fuels.
Money talks. Here are the tariff rates at my place now in p/kWh units:
Night rate electric: 20.70
Day rate electric: 30.29
Gas: 6.95
The net effect of that is that gas is a lot less expensive for heating (even using things that are less efficient), notwithstanding the marketing text that the firm issues, in favour of environmentally friendly sources. Years ago, night rate electric was roughly 1/3 of the day rate, so it’s that one that has been jacked up so far.
Add to that the fact that we do not have enough generating capacity to meet our current needs let alone an increase in electricity demand. And MiliTwat will not be delivering any additional unreliable energy generation beyond what is already in progress because the lead times will see out the next 5 years.
Watch out for “variable pricing” via your smart meter if you have one, which will seek to charge more based on demand and if the wind isn’t blowing. It won’t be just day or night time rates. It will be rates depending on availability of electricity as we move away from reliable sources like coal and gas. Or as the head of the National Grid (Steve Holiday) said a few years ago “We are going to have to get used to using electricity as and when it is available”——-He meant if it happens to be windy.
Peter W
8 months ago
I think we get a large percentage of LNG from the USA. If Trump fails then Harris/Biden plan to ban all fracking which is where most or all of our gas is coming from.
We need to be less NIMBY and get on with our own fracking.
JXB
8 months ago
Why? Net Zero.
We are not paying for energy being produced and consumed, we are paying for intermittency. That means we are paying for energy that is not being produced or cannot be used.
Gerry England
8 months ago
Plenty of errors. As pointed out below, the UK uses very little Russian gas. Also omitted is the fact that gas prices were on the rise months before the special operation to liberate the 4 eastern oblasts began. As countries awoke from Covid, demand for gas shot up as it was desperately needed to keep the grids going in the face of a couple of years more unreliable generation added, reliable generation retired and the industry having slowed down production in the face of reduced demand and anti-industry ecofascism. It is of course true that prices will keep slowly edging up because the more unreliable generation you add to your grid the more expensive it becomes, as well as closing your own reliable generation and relying on other countries to supply at times of high demand when unit prices are high. This will continue for at least a decade.
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Conflicts around the world created by the US so countries have to buy expensive US LPG, LNG and weapons.
Cui bono.
Follow the money.
Apparently the UK could buy Iraq/Iran oil at 50 dollars a barrel – instead of the current 100 dollars a barrel bought from India who buy it from er, Russia.
USA gets some for free by looting Syria.
And massive profits by selling their LPG to the EU – (but just think of all the wonderful CO2 emitted).
If only Putin hadn’t blown up his own pipeline.
For the gormless out there the last sentence is sarcasm.
Your barking up the wrong tree. We get 50% of our gas from the North Sea and most of the rest from Norway, and the remainder from the USA. America has much lower energy prices than ours because of fracking. We have astronomically high prices because of The Climate Change Act and the pursuit of Net Zero. If you want to understand high prices you must look to our pandering to the UN and it’s Sustainable Development policies that seek to lower the standard of living of the prosperous west because they think our lifestyles are “unsustainable”. The USA mostly resists that but under the Democrats of Obama Biden and Harris if she wins in November, the USA will be drawn more into this Eco Socialism.
Conflicts around the world started by the US have pushed energy prices through the roof for many countries, I’m not just talking about the UK.
You are preaching to the converted when it comes to the bogus climate change debacle and the costs involved.
Please give examples? What conflicts, and were they necessary or not?———Since 2008 when Miliband gave us the Climate Change Act electricity prices have risen 300%. This is due to combination of massive subsidy to renewables paid for on consumers bills and also the link between gas prices and electricity prices since a lot of electricity is produced using gas.
——If I were you I would not give this current eco socialist Labour Government pandering to UN/WEF agenda’s around climate an easy ride by blaming America for the current state of affairs. Our absurd Energy Policies are what are mostly to blame for our current predicament.
List of U.S. attempts to overthrow governments (* indicates success) since 1949:
China 1949 to early 1960s
Albania 1949-53
East Germany 1950s
Iran 1953 *
Guatemala 1954 *
Costa Rica mid-1950s
Syria 1956-7
Egypt 1957
Indonesia 1957-8
British Guiana 1953-64 *
Iraq 1963 *
North Vietnam 1945-73
Cambodia 1955-70 *
Laos 1958 *, 1959 *, 1960 *
Ecuador 1960-63 *
Congo 1960 *
France 1965
Brazil 1962-64 *
Dominican Republic 1963 *
Cuba 1959 to present
Bolivia 1964 *
Indonesia 1965 *
Ghana 1966 *
Chile 1964-73 *
Greece 1967 *
Costa Rica 1970-71
Bolivia 1971 *
Australia 1973-75 *
Angola 1975, 1980s
Zaire 1975
Portugal 1974-76 *
Jamaica 1976-80 *
Seychelles 1979-81
Chad 1981-82 *
Grenada 1983 *
South Yemen 1982-84
Suriname 1982-84
Fiji 1987 *
Libya 1980s
Nicaragua 1981-90 *
Panama 1989 *
Bulgaria 1990 *
Albania 1991 *
Iraq 1991
Afghanistan 1980s *
Somalia 1993
Yugoslavia 1999-2000 *
Ecuador 2000 *
Afghanistan 2001 *
Venezuela 2002 *
Iraq 2003 *
Haiti 2004 *
Somalia 2007 to present
Honduras 2009
Libya 2011 *
Syria 2012
Ukraine 2014 *
https://davidswanson.org/warlist/
Yeah well what about British oil and gas (onshore and offshore) and British coal and British nuclear power? Yeah, let’s blame the Russians. Nothing to do with stupid/evil policy choices going back decades.
Upwards of 300 years of coal beneath our feet, plus shale gas, plus oil and gas and nuclear.
As a minimum we should be fuel independent.
It’s simply tragic
Weren’t you, me and tof just talking about this the other week? Ha! Never in a month of Sundays will the people of the North East adhere to such absolute codswallop. These Woketards can haddaway an’ shite! And I don’t know how they’re able to bring sexism into it as ”pet” is very much a unisex word. Honestly, do these people have anything between their lugs or just bubble and squeak?
”Geordies have slammed Newcastle University for urging researchers to bid ‘Auf Wiedersehen, Pet’ after bosses deemed the slang term sexist.
Diversity chiefs labelled the Tyneside lingo ‘patronising’ in an equality and inclusion toolkit issued to researchers.
Their seven-page guide instructs readers to ‘avoid… terms, such as girls, pet, or ladies’ and asks that groups are referred to as ‘friends or colleagues’ instead.
The advice appears in a section named ‘Talking about Gender‘ which says: ‘Sexism can often be subtle in conversations, and we can all be guilty of it without realising.’
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13761925/Fury-Newcastle-University-urges-staff-drop-Geordie-nickname-pet-word-bossy-theyre-sexist-locals-slamming-call-totally-stupid.html
“And I don’t know how they’re able to bring sexism into it as ”pet” is very much a unisex word.”
I lived in Sunderland for four years. Most of my friends at the time were Mackems, lads and lasses and yes “pet” was unisex. What the numpties fail to understand was that the use of the term “pet” also carried connotations of warmth and friedliness which is and always will be way beyond the cold formalities of friend / colleague. In the North West the equivalent to “pet” would be “love” but it is not quite as warm as “pet.”
“These Woketards can haddaway an’ shite!”
Exactly Mogs. Destroy the language and the culture goes with it.
I cannot compete with the poetry of “haddaway an’ shite!” so firk off will have to do.
And the relevance of this to energy pricing is? Maybe in the wrong thread here…
Thanks Hardliner. And in which thread should the topic go?
Yes …. but then the Globalists/Americans/EU wouldn’t be able to control us.
I hear on TV news dumb socialists supporting Net Zero absurdity saying “we must do this as we have to avert the climate crisis” and other such utter garbage. We must not do this at all as long as the rest of the world is mostly not doing it, and we certainly should not be doing it at brake neck speed by 2030, which apart from being utterly stupid is absolutely IMPOSSIBE. ——For a start there are about 25 million gas boilers in the UK. In 5 and a quarte years from now anyone who thinks we can replace all of those with heat pumps needs certified, and the first person in the mental ward should be Miliband.
Aren’t they guessing? After all, the oil prices seem to be lower than the recent peak values. https://tradingeconomics.com/commodity/brent-crude-oil
But we do not get our gas from Russia. That only accounted for 3% of our gas. 50% comes from our own reserves in the North Sea, which our silly governments want to stop, and the majority of the rest comes from Norway and then the USA.
——I suspect that what will happen with this Labour Eco Fundamentalist Government is that all of the renewable subsidies that have been in the past added to our electric bills will now be added to gas bills instead so as to encourage us away from gas and coerce us into getting heat pumps. This is going to make gas prices very high and people very cold, especially the poorest and pensioners stripped of their winter fuel allowance. ——It is a bare face lie that Labour tell when they say they will make energy prices lower, and another bare faced lie when they say renewables are now cheaper than fossil fuels.
Money talks. Here are the tariff rates at my place now in p/kWh units:
Night rate electric: 20.70
Day rate electric: 30.29
Gas: 6.95
The net effect of that is that gas is a lot less expensive for heating (even using things that are less efficient), notwithstanding the marketing text that the firm issues, in favour of environmentally friendly sources. Years ago, night rate electric was roughly 1/3 of the day rate, so it’s that one that has been jacked up so far.
Add to that the fact that we do not have enough generating capacity to meet our current needs let alone an increase in electricity demand. And MiliTwat will not be delivering any additional unreliable energy generation beyond what is already in progress because the lead times will see out the next 5 years.
Watch out for “variable pricing” via your smart meter if you have one, which will seek to charge more based on demand and if the wind isn’t blowing. It won’t be just day or night time rates. It will be rates depending on availability of electricity as we move away from reliable sources like coal and gas. Or as the head of the National Grid (Steve Holiday) said a few years ago “We are going to have to get used to using electricity as and when it is available”——-He meant if it happens to be windy.
I think we get a large percentage of LNG from the USA. If Trump fails then Harris/Biden plan to ban all fracking which is where most or all of our gas is coming from.
We need to be less NIMBY and get on with our own fracking.
Why? Net Zero.
We are not paying for energy being produced and consumed, we are paying for intermittency. That means we are paying for energy that is not being produced or cannot be used.
Plenty of errors. As pointed out below, the UK uses very little Russian gas. Also omitted is the fact that gas prices were on the rise months before the special operation to liberate the 4 eastern oblasts began. As countries awoke from Covid, demand for gas shot up as it was desperately needed to keep the grids going in the face of a couple of years more unreliable generation added, reliable generation retired and the industry having slowed down production in the face of reduced demand and anti-industry ecofascism. It is of course true that prices will keep slowly edging up because the more unreliable generation you add to your grid the more expensive it becomes, as well as closing your own reliable generation and relying on other countries to supply at times of high demand when unit prices are high. This will continue for at least a decade.