Could latest delays in Hinkley C presage bankruptcy of EDF and more British bailouts?

The latest announcement from EDF that Hinkley C will be further delayed and that EDF will be hit with even more cost overruns risks making true the prediction of EDF former Finance Officer that the project will bankrupt the company. This may well lead to increasing pressures on the UK Government to put billions of UK taxpayers money into the project.Hinkley C, which former EDF boss Vincent de Rivaz said (in 2007) would be generating by the end of  this year (2017) will now, according to EDF,...

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This Parliament is almost a perfect storm that favours Labour

As political scenarios go, the new Parliamentary position is just about as good as it gets for an Opposition. The Government is facing an almost impossible task (securing 'good' Brexit terms), is much too weak to push through much the Opposition doesn't really want, and has seriously lost its political momentum. Crucially, the historical precedents are heavily stacked against the Government surviving anything like its full Parliamentary term.Let's put it this way. The current Tory Parliamentary...

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France to tilt EU energy market towards nuclear power

The French Government's announcement that it will legislate for a carbon floor price of 30 euros per MWh marks a dramatic turn in EU energy markets which will now be shifted to favour nuclear power above renewables. This is because just over half of nuclear power generated in the EU come from reactors in France, whereas less than 10 per cent of EU renewable energy production comes from France. The fact that nuclear power is being given special privileges undermines the policy credibility of the...

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Why Greens should stop beating themselves up over the lacklustre general election performance

I suppose it's inevitable that any party will engage in some soul searching and point-settling when it loses votes, but we should consider that in the context of a generally greater focus on the two party contest that it is unlikely that ANY Green Party strategy would have avoided a substantial fall in votes.The focus on the most Presidential campaign that has been framed in Britain for decades (May versus Corbyn), the relative resurgence of Labour and also the special appeal that Labour made to...

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Now that Trump has pulled USA out of Paris can China take a lead in fighting climate change?

Now that Donald Trump has pulled the USA out of the Paris Agreement more attention has been focused on China's role in reducing carbon emissions (the title of a book of mine that has just been published). And it seems there is a good chance that China will be able to reduce its energy-related carbon emissions by as much as two-thirds by 2050.Given China's apparently accelerating growth in output of carbon emissions, this does seem a strange conclusion to make. But only if we ignore recent trends...

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Labour pledges massive target for renewable energy

It still may require a slight touch on Douglas Adams' improbability drive to imagine that a Labour Government could emerge from this general election, but let us assume that it happens and we can talk about what this might mean for green energy prospects. Basing my analysis solely on what Labour's manifesto says, perhaps two words sum it all up: benign confusion. But within that, there's no way around it. Labour are pledging to achieve a massive target for renewable energy.The manifesto says, in...

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