CfD Subsidies Reach Record High In Dec 2023
January 11, 2024
By Paul Homewood
h/t Paul Kolk
From The Spectator:
Remember those days two years ago, when the renewable lobby was gloating about how much renewable energy was saving us for those few months when gas prices spiked?
Well, for the last year normal service has been resumed, and last month subsidies to renewables via CfDs hit a record high of £229 million.
Since the scheme began, the total subsidy has added up to £7.2 billion. This is, of course, on top of subsidies paid to renewables via ROCs which at current prices have cost £73 billion to date.
Added together, that’s a cool £2700 per household.
13 Comments
Comments are closed.
NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT 
Subsidies + levies + CfDs + curtailments = highway robbery of consumers with Ofgem blessings – if renewables are so much cheaper than fossil fuel or nuclear power, then let them stand on their own merit (they aren’t, they won’t)
But according the the zealots we are not committed to climate change, just squandering money for fun!
I have in writing from DESNZ that CfDs have brought the cost of electricity down! any thoughts?
Well, the alternatives are:-
1) They’re lying
2) They don’t know what they’re talking about.
Using the data from the Low Carbon Contracts Company available here:
https://dp.lowcarboncontracts.uk/group/cfd-actuals
(IMRP and CFD Actual datasets)
I produced the following chart that shows by technology and in total (blue dashed line) the production weighted average CFD strike price since the very first CFD came into operation.
For comparison I have plotted the time averaged day ahead hourly price (IMRP), from which it is easy to see that market prices have fallen back way below what we are paying on CFDs, which has continued a basic upward trend. The recent small step down is the result of biomass CFDs at Drax and Lynemouth restarting now that the Baseload Market Reference Price for the winter is no longer acting as a massive tax that made operating unviable except in extreme market conditions, and the effect of Triton Knoll deciding that it should take up its CFD rather than pay Windfall Profits Tax – a decision that is working out for them given that the CFD pays £97.82/MWh currently (the cheapest offshore wind CFD in payment).
It is surely very hard to argue that CFDs reduced the cost of electricity when they have been consistently above market prices except for the extreme crisis period, and they are back at a substantial premium to market again.
A good question ta ask your MP is; ‘ Do you support continuing the subsidies paid to renewable energy suppliers at the expense.of bill payers?’
I will be asking this of my MP who happens to be a member of the Conservative Environmental Network. The next question could be; ‘ Should gas energy generators continue to pay a carbon tax?’
If renewables had to supply continuous electricity then they would have to use gas energy generators, so would the carbon price then be considered necessary by them?
I have just emailed him. 🙂
last month subsidies to renewables via CfDs hit a record high of £229 million.
The numbers can only get bigger, faster, under present policies. Also on the green road to ruin…
California faces $37Billion budget crisis as Gavin Newsom proposes slashing climate change programs, housing and clean energy spending for state
11 January 2024
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12949705/California-budget-deficit-gavin-newsom-proposed-cuts-energy.html
I guess when you turn your state into a lawless shithole that drives away businesses and decent people vote with their feet, your income from taxation is going to drop. Welcome to DemoTwat World.
It should be illegal to talk about carbon, carbon footprint or carbon capture without adding a suffix. Are we talking about the element carbon as in charcoal or rod or carbon fibre? or are we talking about one of the gases, such as carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide or methane? or any one of the other carbon compounds? I am certain that a majority of the public, politicians, mainstream media and power elites have no idea what form of carbon is being discussed let alone what a greenhouse gas is or does.or how they vary.and are produced. Alarmists who justify nothing scientifically now lump any adverse effect including pollution under the general term climate change. They say “carbon” capture, whatever that is, is the magic cure all. This is not only mostly wrong but it is grossly misleading..
ESO have also run up a 1.65B bill in the balancing mechanism so far this FY managing the unreliables.
It’s even worse than you think. The Speccie data isn’t for the whole month. The full data is now available and that shows over £255m for wind subsidies in the month. The quarterly data is rising Q-o-Q and with a further indexation in April, 2024 could well be a record year.
https://davidturver.substack.com/p/record-cfd-subsidies-for-wind-power