As flagship nuclear projects run into long delays and huge cost overruns, solar and wind power are falling in price, writes David Elliott. Renewables already supply twice as much power as nuclear. It's just too bad the nuclear-fixated UK government hasn't noticed.
David Elliott, 18 Dec 2014, The
Ecologist
As flagship nuclear projects run into long delays and huge cost
overruns, solar and wind power are falling in price, writes David
Elliott. Renewables already supply twice as much power as nuclear.
It's just too bad the nuclear-fixated UK government hasn't noticed.
Renewables are winning out just about everywhere. They now supply over 19% of
global primary energy and 22% of global electricity. Nuclear is at 11% and
falling.
With many of the UK's old nuclear power plants off-line due to faults
and prospects for their ultimate replacement looking decidedly shaky, it
is good that the renewable energy alternatives are moving ahead rapidly.
In 2013 nuclear supplied around 18%
of UK electricity but in the third quarter of 2014, nuclear output fell 16.2%
due to outages, while renewable output, which had reached 16.8% of electricity
in the second quarter of 2014, was up 26%, over the previous year.
Indeed, there were periods in 2014 when wind alone met up to 15% of UK power
demand, over-taking nuclear, and it even briefly achieved 24%.
What next? The financial
woes of French developers Areva and EDF may mean that their £24 billion 3.4
GW Hinkley nuclear project, despite being heavily subsidised by British
taxpayers and consumers, will get delayed or even halted, unless China or the Saudis
bail it out.
Meanwhile, wind has reached 11GW, with 4GW of it offshore, solar is at
5GW and rising, with many new projects in the pipeline. By 2020 we may
have 30GW of wind generation capacity and perhaps up to 20GW of solar.
Renewables get cheaper, nuclear gets
more expensive
It's true that this will require subsidies, but the technology is getting
cheaper and by the time Hinkley is built, if it ever is, the Contact for a
Difference (CfD) subsidy for on-land wind, and maybe even for solar, will be
lower than that offered to the Hinkley developers (£92.5/MWh).
Indeed some say solar won't
need any subsidies in the 2020s, while offshore wind projects could be
going ahead with CfD contracts below £100 / MWh, and without the £10 billion
loan guarantee that Hinkley has been given.
The simple message is that renewables are getting cheaper and more
competitive, while nuclear remains expensive, and its cost may well rise
- requiring further subsidies.
The completion of the much delayed EPR at Flamanville, similar to the
Hinkley design, has been put
back by yet another year, to 2017, putting it even more over-budget.
The EPR being built in Finland,
work on which started in 2005, and which
was originally scheduled to go live in 2009, is now not likely to be
completed until
late 2018. It's now almost twice over budget.
It's hardly surprising then that most of the major EU power companies
and utilities have backed away from nuclear, including SSE, RWE and
Siemens, and most recently E.ON, in favour of renewables.
And globally it seems clear that renewables are winning out just about
everywhere. They now supply over 19% of global primary energy and 22% or more
of global electricity. By contrast nuclear is at around 11% and falling.
Country by country, renewables are
taking over the world
Looking to the future, there are scenarios for India, Japan, South
Korea, the USA and the EU, looking to renewables to supply most of their electricity,
with Germany and Denmark of course already acting on them - Germany is aiming
to get at least 80% of its electricity from renewables by 2050, Denmark 100%.
For example, a WWF report says China
could get 80% of its electricity from renewables by 2050, at far less cost than
relying on coal, and enabling China's to cut its carbon emissions from power
generation by 90% without compromising the reliability of the electric grid or
slowing economic growth. And with no need for new nuclear.
Although renewables are not as developed as in China, India has been
pushing them quite hard, with wind at nearly 20GW, on top of 39GW of
existing large hydro. PV is at 2.6 GW grid-linked so far, but Bridge
to India is pushing for 100GW by 2020.
Funding problems and policy changes have bedevilled the development of renewables
in India, as have weak grids, with some saying that off-grid or mini grid
community projects ought to be the focus.
The new government in India certainly faces some challenges. But WWF/TERI
have produced an ambitious 'near 100%' by 2050 renewables scenario, with over
1,000GW each of wind and solar, plus major biomass use.
The US has now gets near 15% of its electricity from renewables, with
wind power projects booming, and Obama's policy of cutting emissions
from coal plants by 30% by 2030 should speed that up. The US National
Renewable Energy Lab has developed scenarios showing that the US could potentially
generate 80% of its electricity from renewables by 2050.
In Japan renewables had been given a low priority, but following the
Fukushima nuclear disaster in 2011, Japan is now pushing ahead with
some ambitious offshore wind projects, using floating wind turbines, and
a large PV programme.
Overall, Japan has given the go-ahead to over 70 GW of renewable energy projects,
most of which are solar. Longer term, a '100% by 2050' ISEP renewables scenario has around
50GW of wind, much of it offshore, and 140GW of PV.
Rapid progress is being made in South America, although less so as yet
in most of Africa. But the International Renewable Energy Agency says
that Africa has the potential
and the ability to utilise its renewable resources to fuel the majority of its
future growth.
Yet the UK remains firmly stuck in a
1950s vision of the future
Back in the UK though, we have our large nuclear programme, with EDF one of the
main backers. It can't build any plants in France (which is
cutting nuclear back by 25%), but the UK seems to be willing to host
several - and pay heavily for them!
Similarly, Hitachi and Toshiba stand no chance of building new plants in
Japan, but the UK is offering significant long-term subsidies and loan
guarantees for their proposed UK projects. A far better deal than being
offered to renewables.
Here the main focus seems to be on why we can't afford offshore wind, or accept
on-land wind, or live with large solar farms.
We struggle on - now generating over 15% of UK electricity from renewables, but
far behind most of the rest of the EU, and especially
the leaders, with some already having achieved their 2020 targets,
nearly all of which were set higher than that for the UK.
In fact, despite having probably the largest potential of any EU
country, we are still only
beating Luxembourg and Malta.
It's embarrassing ...
David Elliott is Emeritus Professor of Technology Policy at the Open
University. His latest book is 'Renewables: a review of sustainable
energy supply options'.