In other news..”Risk of energy blackouts triples.”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/energy/10145803/Risk-of-UK-blackouts-has-tripled-in-a-year-Ofgem-warns.html#disqus_thread

“Shale gas in northern England could meet Britain’s gas needs for 40 years”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/energy/10145414/Shale-gas-in-northern-England-could-meet-Britains-gas-needs-for-40-years.html
http://bishophill.squarespace.com/blog/2013/6/27/outgassing.html

It looks as though we are going to finally get a look at the British Geological Survey’s report on shale gas resources later today. The media seem to have got their hands on a press release and there are some big numbers being touted around:

UK shale gas resources may be far greater than previously thought, a report for the government says.

The British Geological Survey was asked to estimate how much gas is trapped in rocks beneath Lancashire and Yorkshire.

It said there could be 1,300 trillion cubic feet at one site alone, but it is unclear how much could be extracted.

With UK demand at slightly less than 3 tcf per annum, that looks like very good news, but of course the figure of 1300tcf (assuming the reports are correct) is not what will ultimately be extractable. There’s an interesting exchange of views about these figures on Twitter, with Greenpeace’s Damian Kahya (an ex-BBC journo) saying that we should be using a figure of 4% and the BBC saying 10%.

Nick Grealy notes that the average in the USA is 18%, and one has to recognise that this incorporates all the older wells, in which relatively primitive fraccing approaches were used.

Cuadrilla have said that 15-20% will ultimately prove to be a conservative estimate, as the technology improves, and numbers as high as 40% have been mooted by industry insiders.

Steven

Stop Press: Tim Yeo stands down

“Tim Yeo will tonight stand down as Chairman of the Energy Select Committee to clear his name.”

http://order-order.com/2013/06/10/yeo-goes/

Steven

Appalling as the Yeo matter seems to be I am actually far, far more concerned with the whole energy policy which, unless it is seriously challenged, will take the country back to the Middle Ages!

Agreed, but my point is that the reason we are in such a parlous state is that we are too heavily influenced by people like Yeo, who seem to have undue power in both government and the renewables industry.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/investing/10110127/Lobbying-row-Tim-Yeo-remains-at-helm-of-Albion.html

Steven

ECC committee to discuss Yeo tomorrow

Senior Tory Tim Yeo faces a showdown meeting tomorrow with MPs over whether he should continue chairing a Commons committee following controversy over commercial interests.

http://bishophill.squarespace.com/blog/2013/6/10/ecc-committee-to-discuss-yeo-tomorrow.html

Steven

Tim Yeo reported to the police

http://bishophill.squarespace.com/blog/2013/6/10/yeo-reported-to-police.html

Mr Yeo has also boasted of coaching a witness, with whom he has a financial relationship, before they appeared before his Select Committee:

“This morning I had a case, in front of the committee we had a company called Great British Railfreight who have big contracts for moving coal and biomass around the country. And I said, because GB Railfreight is a subsidiary of Eurotunnel, I could not ask this guy any questions in public because it would look as though I might be biased about that. But what I do for him in private is another matter altogether, obviously … I was able to tell him in advance what he should say.”

This seems to us improper, given Mr Yeo has declared that he has received £37,483 in the last 12 months from Eurotunnel SA. The public interest is, you will no doubt agree, best served by holding elected law makers to the highest standards. I urge you to proceed with an investigation using the evidence available.

Let’s see how this works out…

Steven

Although this proposal, from Caroline Lucas, did not in fact make it onto the energy bill in the end, it does show that there are MP’s who seriously believe that the way forward for the UK is that it is arbitarily possible to cut electricity usage by up to 40%, without any ill effects.

Points:

Steven

Tim Yeo, the MP for Suffolk South, and an advocate for renewables, has allegedly been caught offering high level government contacts for cash. He was reputed to be offered £7,000 a day.
http://bishophill.squarespace.com/blog/2013/6/9/yeo-stushie.html
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/10108603/Lobby-row-Tim-Yeo-MP-pulls-out-of-television-interviews-and-refers-himself-to-standards-committee.html

He is chairman of the government climate change committee and simultaneously president of the industry Renewable Energy Association.
http://www.clickgreen.org.uk/green-career/green-appointments/123383-tory-mp-tim-yeo-named-president-of-renewable-energy-association.html

Surprising it took so long for a sting on him.

If this is the standard of the main supporters of the renewables movement, then we really are in a mess.

Steven

Tim Yeo recants, a bit.

Humans may not be responsible for global warming, according to Tim Yeo, the MP who oversees government policy on climate change.

Tim Yeo was one of the first MP’s to see the possibilities of consultancy fees and directorships for promoting the cause of global warming, and the chance of an EU post for when he retires from his constituency at the next election. But he his now backtracking, as are many other politicians, as the CC meme finally gets exposed as a huge failure and an even bigger waste of money.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/environment/climatechange/10086694/Tim-Yeo-humans-may-not-be-to-blame-for-global-warming.html#disqus_thread

As one of his constituents in Suffolk South I believe that he is now aware of the huge unease here, about his activities in blatantly exploiting the subject of climate change. Whether it is the obvious conflict of being chairman of a government committee on climate change and at the same time chairman of the renewables industry organisation, or his many extra parliament consultancy jobs, it has not gone unnoticed. We have also noticed that the only party publicly wishing to end the waste of hundreds of billions on climate change, and which is gaining votes locally, is UKIP.

The local rise of UKIP may not be due entirely to Tim Yeo, but he epitomises one of the reasons why many Conservatives have turned away from them. Tim, like many other Conservative parliamentarians, has simply forgotten what it means to be Conservative.

Tim’s yo-yoing has been noticed across the Web.
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100219218/trougher-yeo-recants-on-global-warming/
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/05/29/its-official-we-are-all-climate-sceptics-now/#more-87270
http://joannenova.com.au/2013/05/tim-yeos-switches-from-deniers-last-gasp-to-warming-might-be-natural/

Steven