Is wind energy subsidised?

If you are thinking that government is directly funding wind turbines with tax payers money, then the answer is a big NO!

If you mean that there are incentives to cut carbon emissions then the answer is YES.

ROCs

The primary mechanism to help cut carbon emissions in the electricity generation industry is called the Renewables Obligations system and Renewable Obligation Certificates (ROCs). This system works to shift money from companies that produce high carbon energy to those that produce low carbon energy. The government purely sets obligations levels each year for renewable energy and companies get Renewable Obligation Certificates for each 1MWh of electricity produced from renewables. Every company must produce a certain percentage of renewable energy each year (the obligation) and that amount is increased from year to year, so that the pressure is on to reduce emissions. Companies that produce more than what their obligation requires, can sell excess ROCs that they are allocated to energy companies that haven't done enough. If an energy company has not met it's obligation and can also not buy enough ROCs, then it has to pay some money into a fund. This money is then redistributed to companies that were successful in meeting their obligations.

So the basic outcome of this scheme is that 'greener' energy companies get paid money by the 'browner' energy companies and the admin costs to run the scheme come out of the fund described previously. The net result is that the government only set targets and do not subsidise the system.

If you analyse the RO system, you would realise that there is only money in the system if companies fail to meet their obligation. If they all installed enough capacity each year, the market for selling ROCs would fall.

Of course it may mean higher energy costs in order to produce lower carbon energy. But then economies of scale are reducing costs and for many years high carbon energy has been subsidising our lives.

OFGEM info about Renewable Obligation Certificates


CCL

The second mechanism is the Climate Change Levy.
This is a 'carbon' tax aimed at businesses and large organisations, it doesn't apply to domestic energy users or charities. The tax applies to the use of high carbon energy and companies/organisations can apply for reductions in  the tax if they use electricity generated from a low carbon energy source, or they install measures that reduce their carbon footprint.
The tax is collected and becomes a part of the total UK government tax income, it isn't spent on wind turbines although the government could use it to help a company develop a new wind turbine in the same way as it could be used to help Nissan develop a new car!
One could only imagine it as being a subsidy if you didn't think CO2 emissions needed to be reduced and the bulk of todays climate changes wasn't caused by them. Many companies actually prefer reducing their Climate Change Levy burden by introducing energy saving measures rather than signing up for a green energy tariff, so it is difficult to see how the greener energy companies would benefit.

Climate Change Levy (DECC)

All in all, there are a tremendous number of lies told about wind energy in order to discredit it. Hardly surprising given the vested interests in the older and established energy technologies.

Sainburys in action?

I think this is the start of the Sainsburys development in Waterlooville. First thing they do is chop some trees down next to the old Sprint Print building. I assume it is to improve access and the roundabout area. This section was actually the original field boundary between a farm and Hambledon road, when the dual carriage way was built, more trees were added to the existing hedgerow.

 

Another chunk of trees removed. This time for a disability ramp sweetner that Sainsburys chucked in to oil the wheels of planning approval. The ramp will make it easier for electric disability buggies and wheel chairs to access Waterlooville and I guess Sainsburys. Yes it is needed, but maybe if the HBC/HCC planners thought about people instead of just cars, we wouldn't be in this situation today.

 

Tree carnage. The price we pay for bad planning in the past (disabled access is not possible via the underpass, or rather legislation means that a ramp at the underpass would be to steep for wheelchair users) and the climate changing love of cars that enables Sainsburys to exist.

Not so cool towers

Video time...
Here we have an Ecotricity advert of cooling towers being demolished:

Drought warnings

News today that Caroline Spelman the Environment Secretary will be discussing how we might handle a major drought later this year brings back memories of the 1976 drought. Back then water supplies to houses were cut off and stand-pipes were fitted in streets in an attempt to ration water. People had to take containers to the stand-pipe to fill with water.
This of course is predicted to be a more common event in the South East, where fears are that over-development will result in shortages of resources, especially water. Meanwhile we have numerous housing developments in the area, with homes being built at rates unseen in the borough for many years. More water shortages, more traffic and CO2 emissions to come!

No prayers in council meetings

It is good news that the councillor in Bideford has won a court case to remove prayers at the start of council meetings.

I have been to a few meetings at Havant Borough Council and was a bit shocked that this was happening in a political meeting designed to discuss and vote on issues for everyone in our community. It does alienate people who have no interest in religion and is plain wrong. Such traditions can have a distorting influence on the way democracy is progressed.

I hope the old peoples club that we call Havant Borough Council will take note and changes made.

More local developments

It seems that Waterlooville and Havant Borough in general is now inundated with house, supermarket and hotel building. In some cases, the developments can probably be justified, in other cases the developments are IMO criminal acts. Lets list them:

Woodcraft Farm - criminal act of environmental damage

The site is probably as green a site that you could possibly get in Havant Borough, with many excellent trees. One questions why this site is even considered suitable for development, when brown field sites are available, such as the Caetano site.

How are we supposed to maintain the green spaces around us when council policies allow developments on these spaces? What is really sad is that the main objections locally is the increased traffic that might occur!

Old Purbrook School playing fields - probably justifiable

Of all the sites, this one can probably be justified given that it is in the middle of a suburban area. Although even this could be developed into a green space for community use, such as an urban community garden space. It is situated next to the roundabout at the top of Stakes Road and near Crookhorn school.

Sainsburys supermarket

I think locally many are dreading the disruption later this year when work will probably start on the Caetano site, firstly with demolition and then building work. It was a nightmare when the nearby retail park was built. The new Sainsburys will have a similar impact and as with all these retail units, will encourage car use and more CO2 emissions. Yet another nail in the coffin of Waterlooville town centre. More cafes, charity shops and fast food outlets to come I think.

New Hotel - Bosmere Field

Why do we need more hotels? The government talks about balancing the economy, yet this week Cameron welcomes 5000 new Asda jobs and 1000 jobs with McDonalds! What planet does Cameron live on? Was Britain great because it served the world and gave up bothering with science, design. invention etc??

New Computer

Old Pentium IV motherboard and processor. The large
lump at the back with a fan on top is the processor
and heat sink

After many years using a second hand (£50) Pentium IV computer I decided it was about time to upgrade to a new computer.

The options were to buy another second hand computer or recycled computer or even a new one. I found some refurbished dual core computers for about £150, which would have been a lot cheaper than buying a new low end computer for £260.

I didn't need any new display or keyboard etc.

Even these costs were high, so I decided to look at replacing the motherboard. Initially I looked at buying separate motherboard, processor, ram, graphics card etc.

Fine, but it takes hours and hours and hours to match all the components and to keep an eye on the total cost. Plus you have a worry about it all be 'compatible'.

So then I started looking at 'bundles', this makes things easier, because someone has taken the time to match components. At first I spotted a bundle at Maplins for a motherboard with a 3 core 2.5Ghz AMD processor, all for £89. Wow, that looked good, but they rapidly sold out and there were no more by the time I decided to take the plunge.

So I had to start looking again. Finally found a small company selling a bundle for £104. The Motherboard has a single IDE socket as well as SATA connections, which meant I could use the old hard drive and DVD drive. It also has reasonably good Nvidia graphics chips. The processor is a 3Ghz 2 core AMD Athlon and the board has 2 gb of ram. After checking compatibility of a number of other connections I took the plunge and ordered the bundle.

The result is excellent. Installed it at the weekend and I am really pleased with the performance. So I have a new computer, whilst keeping all the old drives, case, keyboard, display, mouse and power supply.