DECC

Gas prices – time to return to reality

March 26, 2013 11:09 am by Nick Butler
Ed Davey, secretary of state for DECC

Ed Davey, secretary of state at DECC, outside his ministry

The UK’s Department of Energy and Climate Change is about to publish forecasts suggesting that gas prices could rise by up to 70 per cent over the next five years. This is scaremongering nonsense, and shows just how out of touch the Department is with the realities of the international energy market. Officials appear not to have consulted the industry or the traders. In reality the odds are that prices are just as likely to fall as to rise for three distinct reasons. Read more

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Posted in Gas, Policy, Renewables |

The UK energy department’s corridors of power

January 16, 2013 4:38 pm by Nick Butler

The UK’s Department for Energy and Climate Change has a new permanent secretary, as predicted before Christmas. The elegantly orchestrated process, along with a comparable process at the Home Office has reasserted the independence of the civil service appointments process. Sir David Normington, the first civil service commissioner is providing to be more than a match for Francis Maude, Theresa May and the others who want to make senior civil servants political appointees.

Stephen Lovegrove, the new man at the DECC, has a number of challenges to overcome. Read more

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Posted in Climate, Policy |

Energy beyond nationality

July 17, 2012 10:23 am by Nick Butler

The announcement that Areva are to join with China’s Guangdong Nuclear Power Holding Company to bid for new capacity in the UK represents a bold statement in favour of globalisation and against established judgments of national energy security by the UK government.

The traditional view has been that the UK’s strategic resources should be under the control of nationally controlled or “friendly” entities.   When BP’s privatisation in the 1980s failed in the face of a market downturn and more than 20 per cent of the shares were picked up by the Kuwaitis, Mrs Thatcher reacted vigorously and the Kuwaitis were forced to sell down.

The main concern has been Russia. Read more

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Posted in Electricity, Nuclear, Policy, Politics |