Green Electricity

[stuartiannaylor]

CTE, In know way a criticism but I did read somewhere that the investment percentage of "Good Energy" is pretty low. In fact even though I can't remember the URL I seem to remember with surprise that Scottish Power was beating them on green investment.
We should start a thread or something that updates the the green investment rather than costs of all the majors as the figures change all the time.

[stuartiannaylor]

Wish I could remember that URL so far the only thing I have found is http://www.ecotricity.co.uk/for-your-home/uk-s-greenest-energy/how-green-is-your-energy-company
But erm how independent this is ... maybe not.

[Ted]

I've split this from the other thread.

[dhaslam]

A green energy supplier doesn't have to invest anything in generation, they just have to buy from  suitable suppliers.   The main thing is that buying from these  companies leads eventually  to  further investment somewhere.     In many ways it is better for the green energy company  to only act as an agent  and not  compete with their  suppliers.         

[smegal]

I suppose energy is no different to any other industry but there is so much greenwashing and immorality within the power industry.

Is there any need to rubbish ones competitors by using questionable statistics?

[stuartiannaylor]

Yeah it wasn't a criticism of Good Energy as I couldn't remember the URL. You know me if I had the proof I would of whipped it.
The main reason I called for a new thread was I noticed CTE was with Good Energy and I recently advised a local business who went with Ecotricity.
Thinking about it was probably the whichgreen.org site that prompted my action.

What I do remember is that I was trying to find out what does green energy mean? What are there sources and what percentages are required to class as a green energy source. To be honest I haven't a clue. It could be Sizewell B in a nifty racing green number for all I know.

If anyone manages to glean any infomation, that was the reason for a call for a new thread.

Also I dunno is a green energy supplier just an agent or is it someone who produces or invests?
I don't think they have to be, just want them to though.

[Philip R]

CTE,
Don't knock Sizewell A, in decommission now, too much. It is SZA's grid connection that is being utilized to connect the Greater Gabbard wind farm to the 400kV system.

If you look at the Great Gabard website and read about the grid connection, no mention is made of the detail of the grid connection.If the nuke was not there, the wind farm costs would escalate significantly.

[stuartiannaylor]

Yeah I am with you there CTE and have very mixed emotions about nuclear. Then again with incidents like chernobly and ten mile island. The scare stories where vastly worse to the the reality.
I don't like nuclear but maybe a necessary evil. Did you read about Chris Huhne and his FIT ammendments where medium scale PV farms are going to have reduced FIT rates.
What I don't like is that it seems prescribed in stone what is going to happen and all we recieve is a green smoke screen of spin. Again it seems a closed market to me where it is divided between corporate and consumer. No room for the start-up or middle sized energy provider which would provide a diversity of solutions.
Apparently farmers who have gone the green path in small scale wind and PV projects are going to be hit hard.

Anyway enough of that as that is exactly what I mean, how much is nuclear. Where does it come from and do they provide investment and growth. We have all have different criteria's for choice but no infomation to base this on.  
 

[wookey]

By some people's definitions, the users of Nuclear power stations would say that they are using Green Energy, based solely on the principle that the uranium is not being burnt to create CO2. - conveniently forgetting the vast energy consumption to build the damn things.

I should resist another nuclear/wind debate, but thought it important to clarify this: For a given amount of generation, wind uses at least as much steel as nuclear does, and quite a lot of concrete too (about 15% as much as nuclear IIRC). So the energy needed to construct them is not hugely different (steel needs a lot more energy per tonne than concrete).

The debate about 'how green is your energy supplier' (and how do we measure that), is much more interesting though, so lets try and stick to that. I note that the wikipedia article repeats the assertion that Good Energy have never invested anything in green generation. Can anyone find a reference for the 12 million investment at delabole which would justify a wikipedia edit?

[stuartiannaylor]

Dunno Wookie, is it because its a refit rather than a new install ?
http://www.delabole.com/windfarm.html

Also I agree with you about construction costs not sure about the decomissioning costs.
http://www.goodenergygeneration.co.uk/developing-renewables/Delabole_Photo-Gallery.aspx

[stuartiannaylor]

I just wonder if anybody can get any facts from the suppliers if you post it here I will host a little web site.
An idependent green energy supplier list would be much better than the the obviously biased whichgreen.org

[Ivan]

I know Good Energy have been involved in some dodgy dealings, and we certainly had an unpleasant experience with them a while back - they've always tried to portray themselves as a small, credible, honest alternative to big bucks ecotricity, but I think the reality is that they all sing from the same hymn sheet

[Ted]

Finding the truth in this is probably almost impossible.

FWIW Dale Vince posted some info (from Ecotricity's viewpoint obviously) on his personal blog:

http://zerocarbonista.com/2009/05/12/good-energy-lies/

http://zerocarbonista.com/2009/05/21/good-energy-lies-part-two/

Read down in the comments - there is an exchange between Good Energy and Dale on the first link.


There is also this government sponsored scheme to try to 'certify' green electricity - http://www.greenenergyscheme.org - although I'm not too sure of the credentials of their 'panel of experts' or whether the criteria they use match everyone's expectations of Green Electricity.

[stuartiannaylor]

Ted your the man, do you fancy setting up a energy portal "Ask Ted" .com

http://www.electricityinfo.org/ has a lot of facts. The documents supplied seem to me on a first browse that basically the "green energy supplier" has a lot of rough edges. The URLs you sent have a wealth of infomation so I might be back in a couple of days to comment.

http://www.electricityinfo.org/

gives the mixes

[Ted]

The straight (average) fuel mix figures don't tell the whole story for a supplier. You really need to know the profile of the supply (how it changes in mix at different times of day and at different times of the year) and how that matches your own consumption.

The result could be that your consumption of grid electricity is quite a different mix of sources compared to the simple average for your chosen supplier.