Net Zero is dead. Only the fanatics haven’t realised it
By Paul Homewood
h/t Ian Magness
Rishi Sunak has made the case for building new gas-fired power plants on the grounds that reliable sources of electricity generation are needed to back up the intermittency of wind and solar generation. This simple statement of reality has prompted hostile comments from the usual suspects, claiming that this is inconsistent with Net Zero commitments.
The famous economist John Maynard Keynes once said: “When the facts change, I change my mind – what do you do, sir?”. It is surely clear by now that our current Net Zero commitments are not physically achievable or economically affordable on the timescale claimed.
Like others, I have examined whether or how a decarbonised electricity system might work in 2035 using government projections of investment in wind and solar generation. Detailed analysis shows that we need at least 30 GW of flexible and reliable generation for up to a third of hours in the year when wind and solar generation plus supplies over transmission connections to the continent cannot meet demand. This is the gap that the PM wants to fill.
The alternatives to gas generation are either too expensive or unlikely to be developed in time. Battery systems cost a fortune and are only suitable for short term storage – a few hours at most. Hydrogen is expensive and will require years to develop the necessary infrastructure. Most variants of carbon capture for gas plants are still experimental and large-scale storage of carbon dioxide is proving to be more difficult than expected. Serious amounts of nuclear power cannot be built within 10 years.
Even under favourable assumptions, the alternatives to gas generation can only have a small impact by 2035. The realistic choice is between endlessly extending the life of old and inefficient gas plants or building new and much more efficient units. Unfortunately, the PM is somewhat naïve about the second option. Given the Government’s behaviour over the last 15 years, private investors will not build the plants required without ironclad guarantees backed by serious amounts of money.
The capital cost of gas is, I believe, much lower than for wind or solar when adjusted for availability. Still, about £2 billion per year for 15 years will need to be guaranteed for what are called capacity payments to ensure that new plants are built and available to operate whenever required. The reduction in carbon emissions will be significant. Modern gas plants produce at least 30% less carbon dioxide per MWh of electricity than running plants that are nearly 30 years old.
Building networks that provide reliable and universal electricity supplies is probably the great technological achievement of the 20th century. The economic and social costs of unreliable electricity are huge – ask anyone in South Africa today. Everything from health care and education to offices, warehouses and industry depends on reliable electricity supplies. If businesses and households do not trust the electricity system, they will create their own backup systems using generators and batteries. No government rules will stop them. The result will likely be higher emissions as well as great expense.
The response to Mr Sunak’s article illustrates that many advocates of Net Zero live in a fantasy world and are, apparently, content to sacrifice the future welfare of the UK’s population on the altar of arbitrary and artificial goals. In our world there is a simple choice to ensure reliable electricity supplies in 2035. Either we build a lot of new gas-fired generation capacity, or we extend the life of older inefficient plants. In neither case is a fully decarbonised electricity system possible, but the option of doing little or nothing is clearly worse than making the commitment to building new plants.
There are too many artificial deadlines in the climate change field, but this one is real. It takes between 3 and 5 years to build a new gas-fired power plant at an existing site under the UK’s current planning system. Another 1-2 years is required for contracts and project finance. These are minimum periods as 30 GW of plant capacity can’t be built at one time. A program of this scale must start in 2025 or 2026 to have any chance of meeting the UK’s needs in 2035. Unless we start now, we face blackouts within a decade.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/03/12/rishi-sunak-gas-power-station-net-zero-blackouts/
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NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT 
If only we had politicians who understood the devastating implications of Nut Zero and didn’t just think of their own short-term future.
Our Uniparty politicians have cast all common sense and patriotism to the winds and are slavishly following the demands of their psychopathic globalist overlords who believe that “the real enemy, then, is humanity itself” (Club of Rome). That’s why neither Sunak (WEF puppet) nor Starmer (Bilderberg puppet) will scrap Net Zero. That’s why it is essential that people stop voting for the Con/Lab/Lib Uniparty.
” slavishly following the demands of their psychopathic globalist overlords…” … so implying some brown envelope kid of things, … ( I’d say) .. so isn’t it MORE THAN high time we had a look at their sources of income … what’s to hide ? After all, we are not supposed to hide things from “the authorities” … . every single last penny and perk comes under their microscope.
Theresa May pocketed millions in reward for her treasonous support of the globalist establishment at the expense of the UK electorate after she retired as prime minister: https://dailysceptic.org/2023/10/13/theresa-mays-net-zero-millions/.
The commenter known as Pretty Polly does a one-track post (often top-rated) under articles on The Conservative Woman about the globalist billionaires who are pushing Net Zero, e.g. under this article: https://www.conservativewoman.co.uk/sunak-and-the-mildest-possible-net-zero-flip-flop/.
She claims that George Soros rewarded Theresa May for passing Net Zero into legislation by paying her $125,000 for each of a long series of USA speeches.
Look at all the dosh Net Zero fanatic Bojo pocketed on “the speaking tour” after he stepped down as PM.
To give ministers a certain amount of “benefit of the doubt”, they are by the very nature of the beast generalists dependent on the advice of specialists (via their civil servants). Where we have gone adrift here is in ending up in hock to a cult whose philosophy is that modernity is evil and that we need to get back closer to the simpler, pre-industrial revolution society. Using CO2 as an excuse because it is the one thing that all fossil-derived materials emit in their conversion to useful energy. Ignoring the fact that CO2 is currently “playing a blinder” in terms of increased crop yields and is “greening” the planet to an extent (and at zero cost to anyone) that the eco-cretins can only dream about.
Not that all modern things are bad; having warm houses and the benefits of electricity are good things but only if we acquire or provide them in a way that is in accord with nature (forgetting that nothing is in accord with nature according to their definition of ‘accord’ and ‘nature’.)
So we end up with new gas-fired power stations which (along with nuclear)are in themselves as close as we can get to clean, affordable, reliable electricity and use them only as stand-bys because we have been seduced by the ‘standstoreasondunnit’ argument that wind and sun are free. Course they are; it’s trying to convert them into usable energy that costs an arm and a leg, exacerbated by the fact that one is unreliable per se and the other can only be partly relied on for half the year and is pretty useless north of 50°N!
Good comment, that. I agree with every word of it I wrote!!🧐
Talking of fanatics, you might like to have a look at this piece of nonsense, Paul:
https://londonist.com/london/features/just-stop-oil-interview
I wonder who applies the “Twitter Broadcast” metrics – I have a Twitter account that has been being carpet-bombed with madcrap eco activist bilge (JSO, XR and nutter associates) for a year+, non of the source accounts are, or have been followed – and many have never been visited.
This is information war – and the presence of British Army officers on the payroll of Twitter UK I feel is telling.
The Londonist is part of the Gothamist network – rather easy to be paranoid about who is the hand inside these muppet-puppets….
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gothamist
The Londonist’s self penned “bio”
https://londonist.com/about_us
Last year I queried some climate data (by email) with a Scottish university which was subsequently proven to be false and was highlighted on this forum.
Immediately after, both my linkedin and X profile was bombarded by the same set of nutjobs as you experienced. I had not given details of these accounts so at least one person (probably many) must have gone to some lengths to stalk me.
p.s. went over the aqueduct last May – really quite beautiful.
Ray – yep, it’s a pleasant spot – especially for a cold beverage at The Cross Guns on a sunny day.
My whine is directed at Twitter as, unless I’m missing something (not unknown) – stuff in my feed should from a follow, @me or I’m in a reply – Twitter’s algorithm selects me as a recipient - if there’s any stalking going on it’s by Twitter themselves….
Speaking of energy security & not burning bridges … Let’s make sure we retain our remaining coal power stations, whilst & until these new gas plants actually start producing.
The UK has only one coal fired power station left (Ratcliff) and that’s due to close this year (Sept) – Drax could burn coal instead of forests, but chooses not to, instead hoovering greenfoolery £Billions in subsidies
Quite right: time to end the racket at Drax and to show some statesmanship about securing more and cheaper gas — in the national interest . Hysteria about Lancashire tremors and exploration licence expansion should be seen as special pleading by economic illiterates masquerading as climate fearmongers. Expensive fuel and money printing will be the death of us.
Drax could burn coal instead of forests, but chooses not to
Wut? They burn wood or CLOSE, taking 5% of your electricity with them. Many thousands will die.
Too late for that but what should be done is every old coal fired power station site that has closed over the last five years needs to allocated to a replacement gas station and not allowed to be redeveloped for anything else. The rational for this is the grid infrastructure is already there and designed and ready to move the power where its needed. This will help restrain some of the huge spend that is required to rewire the grid to take windmill power from the east coast or north scotland to where it actually needs to be consumed.
A forlorn hope I’m afraid. They’ve all been blown up except Ratcliffe-on-Soar and that is due for the same treatment this September – no doubt with a grinning Govt Minister pressing the fire button.
Chris,
surely they didn’t blow up the sub stations, for the grid connection?
I agree entirely with St3ve that we need to protect the few remaining coal fired power stations. Unfortunately, the madmen rule and to them these are the devils own carbon sources. They will be destroyed as quickly as possible irrespective of the country’s needs It seems that the fanatics do not see any issue of massive cost to no benefit where CO2 is concerned and totally ignore the reality of increasing worldwide CO2 emissions (irrespective of their dogma).
Drax started demolishing their remaining coal fired units last April. They aim to replace with BECCS.
Few? Thought there was only one
Enough said, except to say that the whole Net Zero climate alarm agenda is cover for the sinister land grab being orchestrated by powerful elites. They want control over our lives because it enriches them at the expense of the Plebs. Mainstream media and politicians are all hoodwinked and cannot or will not see what’s happening.
As for When the facts change, I change my mind – … like the wind n weather then? What ARE facts ? like history being re-written by the victors … Accounting economics I can understand, but political economics and political science ….. Just the art of corruption.
So will we chop off the head today, or should we have done it last week? Facts? – ask the messenger, or maybe the tea-lady … but then again the more we chop , the more we will have to chop …
The FACTS haven’t changed. Net Zero and the arrogant hubris of thinking humans can change the climate has always been deluded ignorance. The Climate Change Act was factually wrong and stupid in 2008 and is still factually wrong and stupid.
Rishi Sunak has made the case for building new gas-fired power plants on the grounds that reliable sources of electricity generation are needed to back up the intermittency of wind and solar generation.
Rishi in design mode: government selecting a technology.
This simple statement of reality has prompted hostile comments from the usual suspects, claiming that this is inconsistent with Net Zero commitments.
They are correct. Hughes ignores Net Zero is law. Building gas plants – even if you could – won’t save you. Redemption requires repeal of Net Zero.
Will be interesting to see if it can be proven that any of our glorious leaders and/or any members of the CCC have been misrepresenting the facts. Misrepresentation leading to financial gain could be a criminal act.
I wish I could believe the tide is turning but this as everyone knows here is more about politics than physics , political decisions driven by quangos like the CCC and huge sums of money in the form of subsidies and so called green investment , look at the shy stir Dale Vince bunging money at the labour party , its just the tip of a huge pile of fetid corruption and theft of tax , a massive global juggernaught of vested interest , sadly its going to take a very long time to stop , either or eventually through huge political change or civil unrest
Yes fine, but it still doesn’t spell out that the ‘iron cladded’ guarantees will cost the UK tax payer/customer £bns which does not have to be spent if the new CCGTs were not crowded out by ‘must run’ unreliables which are also guaranteed by tax payers/customers by another few £bn.
And then there is the £bn on new transmission network.
All together at least twice the necessary economic cost of supply ( if CCGTs were used baseload and load following, rather than ‘back up’.
Net Zero should be dead for one reason only. It does not and cannot achieve what is claimed for it. Man has no control over the climate. The effect of man made carbon dioxide is insignificant. By far the most prolific green house gases are water vapour and clouds over which we have no control.
Having arrived at the logical and practical conclusion that we need gas powered electricity will he now suspend all further wind and solar construction as a perverse waste of money.
Exactly, why not just have gas and nuclear , er hello !!
Having just agreed a new £1 billion round of subsidies for wind? This us performance, as was the boiler tax “repeal”. Sunak knows he will not be PM in 9 months time, so he knows this is meaningless. Labour will not bulld CCGT. It is nothing more than a vain and transparent attempt to save a few Tory seats.
I think Labour will eventually build CCGT. But they will probably waste two years trying not to, until the first big blackout.
Define ‘build.’
Are you expecting nationalized power generation?
Face blackouts with a decade, hmmmm, I think you have seriously miscalculated. The blackouts will commence at the latest in 2028, the earliest in 2026 as the Miliband effect takes over and let no one doubt that power, electrical power is EVERYTHING. Look around, what do you see, water, sewerage, lighting, refrigeration, cooking, heating all controlled by electricity that must be available 24/7/265 and no amount of Wind or Solar intermittent energy can provide that.
The future is a dystopian, dysfunctional nightmare totally beyond the imagination of most – with no reliable electrical energy nothing works.
Nett Zero = Nothing
I’m old enough to remember the 3 Day Week and regular blackouts. It was pretty awful. But lots of Lefties claim the 1970s were wonderful – most far too young to have been there. They are in for a rude shock, when everything stops.
Since then the use of electricity for everything has gradually increased until it is now total.
In the 3 day week I could go to an candle/ paraffin lit pub buy a pint of hand pumped beer , pay in cash and get change from a mechanical till. Try that in a Wheterspoons during a power cut.
Same at a village shop. Has every super market installed diesel generators?
It’s OK, Milliband has a magic wand (no doubt borrowed from Sooty) and he will use it to make electricity generation “carbon free” by 2030.
I am not a fan of J Maynard Keynes but his “When the facts change etc.” is not apposite as the facts about CO2 have not changed.
Nor have the facts about renewables. We know simply have a few more people saying we ought to pay attention to facts rather than wishful thinking.
Net Zero might be on life support, but it can’t be allowed to die. It is part of Mr Global’s depopulation agenda. They are now claiming that human breathing contributes to global warming!
https://www.lifesitenews.com/analysis/the-climate-cult-is-slowly-revealing-its-intent-to-depopulate-the-world/
Although not stated openly (yet), the underlying message is one of depopulation.
Meanwhile, in the real world, as reported on AlJazeera this morning when I turned to them in desperation:
Hundreds of schoolchildren a week being abducted in N Nigeria;
India’s Silicon Valley running out of water due to demand, misuse as fss as lure to plan;
Farmers in Burma being killed by protected elephants when they try to protect their crops (probably encroaching on elephant habitat).
What’s our answer? Bring Boris back and demand that Labour prove they know what a woman is.
The realistic choice is between endlessly extending the life of old and inefficient gas plants or building new and much more efficient units.
The new plants will be of the ‘peaker’ variety so not set up for baseload generation of electricity. The idea is that they charge high rates to run for shortish periods to fill gaps in the supply, as described here…
https://www.drax.com/about-us/our-projects/millbrook-power/#proposal-for-rapid-response-power-station
My attempted reply to your comment appears below.
What concerns me is that no one wants to invest in CCGT plants. Inevitably it will be us, the taxpayers, who will foot the bill.
CCGT plants need relatively continuous use, not the stop start system employed by the Grid (CCGT must stop when the wind blows!). Stop start means that the steam side of CCGT cannot get going. It takes time to boil the water using the gas TB exhaust. As a result the CCGT system delivers very low thermodynamic efficiency and becomes uneconomic for investors.
Did I just answer your comment before it appeared?
Looks like it! Sorry and thanks.
CCGT can “peak lop” , but start-up time from cold is much slower than OCGT. My limited understanding is that OCGT start-up time from cold is typically similar to OCGT start-up time from warm.
My guess is that OCGT is much quicker to install than CCGT, which might be useful if the UK is facing an energy emergency
They will almost certainly be OCGT running as synchronous condensers balancing reactive power and providing inertia. In this mode power up is a matter of seconds as they are already synchronised to the grid and spinning.
These are emergency sticking plasters not solutions.
These are emergency sticking plasters not solutions.
If there is a UK energy emergency caused by the incompetence of our glorious leaders then sticking plasters as a short term fix are better than power cuts.
Mitsubushi offer a 60 MW OCGT with a site install time of 30 days, excluding enabling works, gas connection and grid connection.
Time lapse of a 120 MW site install a few years ago:
At last the leaders of men have noticed the naked Emperor in the room, shame it has to be a GE that revealed all and not just plain common sense?
Serious amounts of nuclear power cannot be built within 10 years.
Start now! The wind things will be falling apart and can be dismembered, ground-up, and used to make a new mountain. Something like a tel: “a mound, a ruin-heap, a hill on which a city stood”. At the top, have a sign saying it is a monument to “Net Zero – a 21st Century colossal waste by government diktat.”
Exactly oldbrew. Rishi claimed they would only be for use measured in a few hours. That implies they would be looking at Open Cycle Gas turbines with no heat recovery from the exhaust gas to drive a steam generator. These really are relatively cheap and much quicker to build but expensive to run. Here is an example of an existing one in Cornwall principally designed to stabilise the long leg of the 400kV transmission grid down there at Indian Queens
The important thing to note is that this OCGT (in common with others) is effectively being utilised (unpowered by its own turbine) as a synchronous condenser almost all of the time to accommodate the asynchronous nature of renewables and regulate the Reactive Power levels that are going haywire regularly. A BESS is also under construction at the same site.
All this indicates to me genuine emergency measures.
Off topic, I have just watched the ITV weather forecast which mentioned that the warmest place in the UK was in Lincolnshire. I was surprised that no specific town or city was mentioned. Could it be that the warmest temperature was recorded at RAF Coningsby? Reminds me that for a while we were told that the warmest temperature was in West London rather than the usually more accurate Heathrow or Kew Gardens
When will the lights go out? by Derek Birkett in 2011. A good read as he says all the things that politicians (& bureaucrats) ignore.