The claims that renewable energy is cheaper than power from fossil fuels and that renewable energy prices are falling were dealt another blow on Wednesday. After a year of the Labour Government’s constant promises of "lower bills", the expected prices and terms of the next auction for renewable energy contracts have been published and they show substantial increases, except for solar. For anyone with a grasp of basic arithmetic, the blow was only not fatal because the claim that 'renewables are cheaper' was already dead. But dyscalculia is rife, especially in Westminster.
Under the Contracts for Difference (CfD) subsidy scheme, developers of renewable energy installations such as wind and solar farms offer bids into an auction, which were initially held every three or so years, but are now approximately annual. These auctions agree the prices, known as the ‘Strike Price’(SP) that developers will be paid for each megawatt hour that they generate – a fixed price, in contrast to other wholesale commodity markets, such as gas. Ahead of the auctions, the government sets out the terms of the auction, and the indicative 'Strike Price' or ‘Administrative Strike Price’ (ASP) it is expecting for each technology type. A table showing the previous and latest auction’s ASPs is shown below.
Offshore wind gets a massive 10.96% increase; its onshore counterpart a more modest rise of 3.13%. Solar gets demoted by 15.63%, which may well not reflect any progress in solar technology, but may rather be the result of the
Discussion
Comments
This week across the site:
To join in with the discussion please make a donation to the Daily Sceptic.
Profanity and abuse will be removed and may lead to a permanent ban.
On a very small optimistic note: For the past 5 years there has been a very large wall poster on the other side of the tills in my local Sainsburys proclaiming that they would be “Net Zero by 2030”accompanied of course by an image of a Wind Turbine …This has now quietly been removed ….. even they know it was impossible….. The Net Zero narrative is crumbling it is only TPTB who hang on to the myth…..
“False promises, half-truths, outright lies and total contempt for the public are this Government’s defining characteristics.”
Correct. But then they were the defining characteristics of the last few as well.
Farage and Tice have warned any companies tempted to big for these contracts that they will be scrapped if Reform becomes the next Government. Hopefully that will put them off bidding.
On the subject of energy, this is the most Aussie video clip you’ll ever see. I think he forgot to take his Tourette’s meds that day😅
https://x.com/juneslater17/status/1948441177033949234
Solar produces maximum output at minimum demand time and is also fragile as clouds can cut output rapidly and threaten the security of the grid. One inverter failure took down Iberia and part of France due to a lack of inertial generation.
I think it’s a mistake to show that table in 2012 prices. In 2025 prices, offshore wind is £117/MWh and floating offshore wind over £280/MWh. In 2025 prices, even solar @£78/MWh is more expensive than the current price of gas-fired electricity (£73/MWh) even with a carbon tax.
I covered in more detail here:
https://open.substack.com/pub/davidturver/p/miliband-wreck-economy-with-ar7?r=nhgn1&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=false
Milliband said he would cut bills by 300
pounds, what he didn’t say is how much he would have to increase bills from the time of the statement, in order to give 300 back some time in the future.
In other words our bills could increase by 400% and come the time for the reduction 300 quid will be the equivalent of a 5 % reduction on the increase of 400 or whatever %.
I have just switched my supplier and it was interesting to see a graphic showing the recent progression of the price cap and forecasts for October and January. Labour managed to increase the cost for 3 out of 4 quarters in their first year and as I suspected the cut this month was to a level higher than last October. The level is working its way ever upwards in a saw tooth. No surprise it is expected to rise in the next two quarters leaving the question of April.
As is said, the price the generator gets is not the only factor. Here in Shropshire, we are in a row with Bute Energy, who want to erect a pylon line through our beautiful county to move the electricity generated from a wind farm in mid-Wales to a grid access point they will also build in Shropshire. This energy is apparently for the exclusive benefit of the people of Wales, so why we have to suffer the pylons and grid access point, who knows. But that’s just one small element of the ridiculous proposal. Bute have two companies, the generator and the transmitter. There are a number of other generators in mid-Wales, but Bute are refusing to connect to them, so there will be even more pylons needed for the others, at even more cost. Why not one power line connected to an existing access point to save money and why not underground everywhere, as is the legal requirement in Wales?