Tag: Net Zero Watch

Which Are The “Stranded Assets” Now?

How quickly things change. It was only two years ago, in 2023, that I was writing posts compiling long lists of quotes from climate activists warning that all assets used for production of coal, oil and gas were about to become obsolete and “stranded.” After all, wind and solar were (supposedly) cheaper and cleaner for generating electricity, which could then power anything and everything. Therefore, anyone stupid enough to make further investments in producing fossil fuels would lose everything. Here is one such post from June 2023, and another from February 2023.

From Manhattan Contrarian

By Francis Menton

How quickly things change. It was only two years ago, in 2023, that I was writing posts compiling long lists of quotes from climate activists warning that all assets used for production of coal, oil and gas were about to become obsolete and “stranded.” After all, wind and solar were (supposedly) cheaper and cleaner for generating electricity, which could then power anything and everything. Therefore, anyone stupid enough to make further investments in producing fossil fuels would lose everything. Here is one such post from June 2023, and another from February 2023.

If you look today, you can still find predictions in 2025 that fossil fuel assets will shortly become “stranded.” (Here is one from Bloomberg from March 6: “Investors Risk $2.3 Trillion of Stranded Fossil Fuel Assets.”). But such predictions are becoming fewer and fewer. Instead, what looks far more likely is that large portions, if not the entire business, of “renewable” electricity generation from wind and sun is likely to get “stranded.”

Consider the latest from the UK. The current Labour government of Keir Starmer, elected just a year ago, is languishing with record-low approval ratings. A YouGov poll in May found Labour with just a 23% “favorability” among the populace, compared to 32% favorability for the Reform Party of Nigel Farage (and 16% favorability for the Conservatives). In other words, if and when the next election is held, Reform could well prevail. Meanwhile, the Reform Party has broken with the former all-party consensus in favor of “net zero,” otherwise known as endless subsidies for wind and solar power.

Two days ago, on July 16, the Deputy Leader of the Reform Party, Richard Tice, wrote to heads of UK renewable energy companies to advise them that a Reform government headed by Nigel Farage would terminate the subsidies for wind and solar energy. Here is a copy of one such letter sent by Tice to Greg Jackson, CEO of Octopus Energy; and here is a July 17 press release from Net Zero Watch publicizing Tice’s initiative. Tice’s letter specifically warns wind developers that if they are granted subsidies in an upcoming round of handouts from the Labour government dubbed “AR7,” a future Reform government will not continue those subsidies:

Let me be clear: if you enter bids in AR7, you do so at your own risk. The political consensus that has sheltered your industry for nearly two decades is fracturing. Reform UK will not be bound by the assumptions or commitments of this failing Labour government.

And from Net Zero Watch’s press release:

Richard Tice is absolutely right to put developers on notice that any new investments will become stranded assets under a Reform government. . . . [T]he real problem with renewables is not political risk but nature itself: the fundamentals of physics and economics, which make wind and solar inherently uneconomic. The industry has been constructed on subsidy, not on market fundamentals. After decades of windfarm handouts, consumers can no longer afford to foot the bill. Politicians can’t override physics or economics – no matter how much they subsidise failure.

The prediction that wind and solar assets will become “stranded” is fundamentally different, and fundamentally sounder, than the comparable prediction for fossil fuel assets. That is because wind and solar generators are entirely a creation of taxpayer subsidies. Without the subsidies they are uneconomic, and they will be worthless the minute the subsidies are withdrawn. In contrast, the fossil fuel assets are economic without government support. The prediction that fossil fuel assets will become “stranded” is based instead on a belief that governments will intentionally destroy these assets in their zeal to stop CO2 emissions. But that means that governments will continue a war on fossil fuels even as it becomes obvious that the alternatives are hugely more expensive, and as consumers are forced to bear the costs of soaring energy prices. My own prognostication is that even the craziest governments will relent in their efforts to destroy the fossil fuel businesses as the costs of doing some become ever more evident.

Back here in the U.S., the Trump administration and Congress have now, via the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, put apparent end dates on subsidies to new wind and solar projects not yet initiated; but they have not threatened to pull subsidies from wind and solar projects that have gotten built based on a commitment of subsidies (particularly tax credits) during the useful lives of the facilities. As such, there would appear to be reason for owners of existing wind and solar facilities to hope that their investments will not become stranded. But it is not a sure thing. There are several ways for the wind and solar investments to fail even if the existing subsidies continue at currently committed levels. For example, wind and solar facilities could turn out to need more maintenance than anticipated to keep going; and if governments will not agree to increase the subsidies at that point, the assets will become stranded. Also, if the end of subsidies for wind and solar developments puts an end to construction of those, then the investments in facilities like factories to make wind turbine blades will become stranded.

Another thing that can and should happen is that the grid operators around the country should restructure the markets by which they acquire electricity from power facility operators to make it such that the grid only buys power that is dispatchable. Such a reform — which is highly desirable — would leave all wind and solar generators stranded.

Back in the oil and gas business, things are booming. Oil and gas production are hitting annual records. The demand for reliable energy only goes up. Anyone who thinks those assets are going to get “stranded” is delusional.

Net Zero Watch warns of growing grid instability

With more than 50 million EU electricity consumers suffering blackouts yesterday, campaign group Net Zero Watch has reiterated its warning that the UK power grid is also becoming increasingly unstable.

From NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT

By Paul Homewood

London: 29 April 2025
For immediate release
Net Zero Watch warns of growing grid instability

With more than 50 million EU electricity consumers suffering blackouts yesterday, campaign group Net Zero Watch has reiterated its warning that the UK power grid is also becoming increasingly unstable.

Grid analysts have suggested a high likelihood that the extent of yesterday’s blackout in Iberia was a result of the Spanish grid operating almost entirely on renewables at the time. The stability of power grids depends on so-called ‘inertia’, a resistance to rapid change that is an inherent feature of large spinning turbines, such as gas-fired power stations, but not of wind and solar farms. Too much renewables capacity on a grid can therefore mean inadequate inertia. As a result, in grids dominated by wind and solar, faults can propagate almost instantaneously across grids, leading to blackouts.

In a recent Net Zero Watch paper, entitled Blackout Risk in the GB Grid, energy system analyst Kathyn Porter pointed out that our own electricity system is also becoming increasingly unstable. Large fluctuations in grid frequency – the first sign of problems – are becoming much more common.

In the past four years, the upper operational [frequency] limit was breached around 500 times in each winter season…the number of such breaches has also been growing steadily, which is consistent with falling grid inertia…and a perception that the grid is becoming less reliable.

In addition, Ms Porter points out that the GB grid experienced a ‘near miss’ at the start of the year.

Net Zero Watch director Andrew Montford said:

For 20 years, every aspect of the grid has been subordinated to the concerns of the eco-warriors. It’s no surprise that our electricity system is now both unaffordable and dangerously unstable. We can no longer afford to have energy policy determined by fantastists.

Notes for editors

Kathryn Porter’s paper can be downloaded from the Net Zero Watch website.

Net Zero Watch ridicules ‘fantasy’ Carbon Budget

Net Zero Watch has ridiculed the Seventh Carbon Budget, which was published today, saying that ‘it doesn’t rise much above the level of fantasy’. The campaigning organisation says that the spending estimates are unaffordable, and are lowballed, because they are based on figures that bear no resemblance to anything seen in the real world.

From NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT

By Paul Homewood

London: 26 February 2025
Net Zero Watch ridicules ‘fantasy’ Carbon Budget

Net Zero Watch has ridiculed the Seventh Carbon Budget, which was published today, saying that ‘it doesn’t rise much above the level of fantasy’. The campaigning organisation says that the spending estimates are unaffordable, and are lowballed, because they are based on figures that bear no resemblance to anything seen in the real world.

The Climate Change Committee, which prepares the budget, says that capital expenditure on Net Zero projects will have to rise from around £18 billion today to over £40 billion by 2029, a level of expenditure that will then have to be sustained for a decade. But Net Zero Watch director Andrew Montford says this is unaffordable:

The Chancellor of the Exchequer is already running out of spending headroom. For the Climate Change Committee to commit the country by law to a financial excess on this scale shows that the whole Net Zero project is not grounded in reality.

And Mr Montford has discovered that even these figures are gross underestimates, because the Climate Change Committee is assuming dramatic reductions in the cost of renewable energy, despite the fact that the ongoing trend is upwards.

Andrew Montford said:

The Climate Change Committee are telling us that Net Zero is going to save us money, but it’s clear that they have simply invented numbers that will lead to that conclusion. This report is not worth the paper it’s printed on.

Notes for editors

1. Real-world estimates of the cost of offshore wind (levelised costs) have been prepared by Net Zero Watch from audited financial accounts of windfarms.

2. Strike prices may be slightly lower than levelised costs because they are index linked and because windfarms can earn prices above their strike prices in various ways.

3. Ed Miliband is currently consulting on the possibility of extending windfarm subsidies to 20 years (from the current 15 years). This comes after the introduction of extra subsidies for windfarms in the shape of the Clean Industry Bonus scheme. These two factors are further indications that windfarm costs are rising, not falling.

Net Zero Watch condemns new windfarm rip-off

Campaign group Net Zero Watch has condemned the renewables industry rip-off of electricity consumers. New data published by the Renewable Energy Foundation reveals that the cost of paying windfarms to switch off soared by 91% in 2024. These payments are necessary when the grid has insufficient capacity to deliver the power to market. Nearly £400 million was paid to windfarms in 2024, and much more than this in indirect costs

From NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT

By Paul Homewood

London: 3 January 2025
Net Zero Watch condemns new windfarm rip-off

Campaign group Net Zero Watch has condemned the renewables industry rip-off of electricity consumers. New data published by the Renewable Energy Foundation reveals that the cost of paying windfarms to switch off soared by 91% in 2024. These payments are necessary when the grid has insufficient capacity to deliver the power to market. Nearly £400 million was paid to windfarms in 2024, and much more than this in indirect costs [1].

The largest single recipient was Seagreen, a new windfarm off the coast of Angus, which received nearly £200 million in these so-called “constraint payments”.

Net Zero Watch director Andrew Montford said:

The Renewable Energy Foundation suggest that Seagreen is making around £270 for each megawatt hour it actually produces, more than three times market averages, because it’s so lucrative to be switched off. This is a truly obscene rip-off of the consumer.

And Mr Montford warned that the situation will become worse.

Windfarms seem to be being deliberately built in Scottish waters, where they will receive lucrative payments to be switched off.

And there are huge numbers of new windfarms planned for Scottish waters, where they will be just as constrained. So the rip-off is only going to get worse.

Note

[1] When windfarms have to switch off, their customers still need power, so it is necessary to pay a gas-fired power station to switch on to meet demand.

The UK pays wind turbines for failure — so the market wants to install more failures

Ponder for a moment how intrinsically unsuitable, maladapted, and worthless wind turbines are to a grid. Their failure is so comprehensive, multifaceted and inevitable, an entirely new and bizarre market was invented to reward their failures. Even when they generate electricity, if the time is wrong, the demand is low, or the network can’t handle it, they will still be paid.

From JoNova

By Jo Nova

Subsidy farms are designed to suck payments from plumbers, bakers and mums and dads.

When failure becomes a commodity…

Ponder for a moment how intrinsically unsuitable, maladapted, and worthless wind turbines are to a grid. Their failure is so comprehensive, multifaceted and inevitable, an entirely new and bizarre market was invented to reward their failures. Even when they generate electricity, if the time is wrong, the demand is low, or the network can’t handle it, they will still be paid. The grid can’t use the power, but the customer still gets slugged for something they didn’t use, or they couldn’t get. In the UK the costs for this useless power grew to nearly £400 million last year.

The largest provider of useless power was SeaGreen wind plant which made nearly twice as much from being “constrained” than from being of service. The Renewable Energy Foundation (REF) reports that SeaGreen earned £100 million for making electricity, and £200 million for being “constrained”. Effectively, the useful electricity it made costs a shocking £2.70 a kilowatt hour, after the other payments are included.

Obviously, when the government rewards failure, the market responds by planning to fail. It follows then that industrial wind plant developers would be bonkers if they weren’t looking for sites where their output would arrive at the worst possible time, or through the most remote and overloaded corner of the network.

Everything about the wind industry has “Rent Seeker” tattooed all over it.

Net Zero Watch condemns new windfarm rip-off

Campaign group Net Zero Watch has condemned the renewables industry rip-off of electricity consumers. New data published by the Renewable Energy Foundation reveals that the cost of paying windfarms to switch off soared by 91% in 2024. These payments are necessary when the grid has insufficient capacity to deliver the power to market. Nearly £400 million was paid to windfarms in 2024, and much more than this in indirect costs [1].

The largest single recipient was Seagreen, a new windfarm off the coast of Angus, which received nearly £200 million in these so-called “constraint payments”.

Net Zero Watch director Andrew Montford said:

The Renewable Energy Foundation suggest that Seagreen is making around £270 for each megawatt hour it actually produces, more than three times market averages, because it’s so lucrative to be switched off. This is a truly obscene rip-off of the consumer.

Windfarms seem to be being deliberately built in Scottish waters, where they will receive lucrative payments to be switched off.

And there are huge numbers of new windfarms planned for Scottish waters, where they will be just as constrained. So the rip-off is only going to get worse.

[1] When windfarms have to switch off, their customers still need power, so it is necessary to pay a gas-fired power station to switch on to meet demand.

SeaGreen wind plant has about 114 towers in the ocean east of Scotland. It could make about 1 gigawatt in theoretical capacity if all the turbines were working, but its actual load factor was a pathetic 14%. Of course, as a subsidy farm, it’s load factor was 200%.

Imagine a coal plant that earned money every time it had to slow down because customers weren’t using as much electricity as the power plant could have made?

h/t to Andrew Montford @Dissentient

DESNZ Permanent Secretary has “shocking” conflict of interest

Campaigning organisation Net Zero Watch has demanded a Parliamentary inquiry into conflicts of interest in Westminster. The call comes after it was revealed that the Permanent Secretary of the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ) has a brother who is CEO of Good Energy, a major operator in the renewables sector.

From NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT

By Paul Homewood

London: 20 November 2024
Whitehall Permanent Secretary has “shocking” conflict of interest

Net Zero Watch calls for inquiry into the renewables sector

Campaigning organisation Net Zero Watch has demanded a Parliamentary inquiry into conflicts of interest in Westminster. The call comes after it was revealed that the Permanent Secretary of the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ) has a brother who is CEO of Good Energy, a major operator in the renewables sector. [i]

The DESNZ register of interest states that “appropriate mitigations” have been put in place, and that Mr Pocklington has agreed not to have direct contacts with Good Energy. But this has been dismissed by Net Zero Watch director Andrew Montford:

“The insinuation that Mr Pocklington no longer speaks to his brother is preposterous. The public needs confidence that decisions are being made in their interests and not those of the family members of civil servants.”

Mr Montford also said:

“I have tried and failed to get Mr Pocklington to tell ministers the truth about the cost of Net Zero.[ii] Indeed, somewhat mysteriously, he seems determined to avoid the subject altogether. Many will conclude that the explanation lies in his conflict of interest.”

The revelation about Mr Pocklington comes just days after it was revealed that Baroness Brown, the chairman of the House of Lords Science and Technology Committee, oversaw the writing of a report that called for immediate support for hydrogen energy storage, despite being the director of a hydrogen company and of a windfarm company,[iii] both of which will reap huge benefits from subsidies. Indeed, the Secretary of State recently announced – apparently in response to the House of Lords report – astonishing levels of subsidy for new hydrogen projects.[iv]

In addition, David Miliband, the brother of the Secretary of State, is involved with a company that invests in gridscale batteries in the UK, a sector that will expect to see huge growth under the Government’s ambitious plans for the energy sector.[v]

None of these conflicts of interest appears to have broken any rules. Net Zero Watch director Andrew Montford said:

“This has been going on for at least ten years, right back to the repeated revelations about Lord Deben’s conflicting interests during his time at the Climate Change Committee.[vi] The rule in Westminster and Whitehall for Net Zero people appears to be that it is perfectly acceptable to have a conflict of interest, so long as it is declared, and if it isn’t, or if there are undeclared payments, a blind eye is turned anyway. It’s shocking.”

Net Zero Watch is calling for a Parliamentary inquiry into conflicts of interest in the Net Zero decision-making process.

Notes for editors

[i] https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/desnz-register-of-board-members-interests-2024-to-2025/bf19565a-3f26-4695-ae55-d16bcfd70338

[ii] https://www.netzerowatch.com/all-news/letter-to-pocklington

[iii] https://unherd.com/2024/09/the-baroness-making-a-fortune-from-net-zero/

[iv] Hydrogen companies will get both capital subsidies and revenue subsidies. The capital subsidies may represent the majority of the construction cost of the electrolysers. On the revenue side, the subsidy will allow hydrogen, with a production cost of at £240/MWh to compete with natural gas at £80/MWh. In other words, the subsidy might be expected to be around £160/MWh. £2 billion is expected to be shared between 11 small electrolyser projects.

[v] https://unherd.com/2024/09/the-miliband-files/

[vi] https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6661513/Climate-Change-chief-John-Gummer-faces-calls-quit-payments-green-businesses.html

Shocking Rise in Whale, Dolphin and Porpoise Strandings as Wind Farms Proliferate Around British Coast

Over the last decade as offshore wind farms proliferated around the U.K., there has been a disturbing rise in coastline strandings of whales, dolphins and porpoises. Since the turn of the century, strandings have more than doubled and are now running at over 1,000 animals a year. The slaughter has been largely ignored by the mainstream media that runs with the agreed narrative that offshore wind is environmentally friendly and is the key to achieving Net Zero by 2050.

From The Daily Sceptic

By Chris Morrison

Over the last decade as offshore wind farms proliferated around the U.K., there has been a disturbing rise in coastline strandings of whales, dolphins and porpoises. Since the turn of the century, strandings have more than doubled and are now running at over 1,000 animals a year. The slaughter has been largely ignored by the mainstream media that runs with the agreed narrative that offshore wind is environmentally friendly and is the key to achieving Net Zero by 2050. In fact, wind turbines, whether on or off the shore, are a clear danger to many endangered species and concerns are mounting about their widespread and harmful effects on the natural world. Years ago, the great cause in environmentalism was to save the whales, but these concerns seem to have abated of late, while the slaughter of millions of onshore bats, along with the destruction of many types of large raptors, is simply ignored.

Andrew Montford of Net Zero Watch has updated his graph on the stranding of U.K. cetaceans and compared it to the rise of offshore wind capacity.

Both totals have soared in recent years. Is there a causal link? Perhaps not one that would inconvenience Net Zero fanatics, but Montford says the suggestion of a causal relationship “remains very strong”.

The Daily Sceptic has reported in the past about the mounting casualties of whales stranded off the north eastern coast of the United States in the wake of massive offshore windfarm construction. There have been around 300 fatalities in the last five years, and many suggest the extensive sonar soundings, pile driving and heavy concentrated vessel traffic is causing havoc with aquatic feeding, breeding and migration up and down the coast.

The latest U.K. stranding figures have been reported to Ascobans, a UN environmental conservation body for cetaceans in the NE Atlantic. Commenting on the “shocking” figures, the environmental writer and campaigner Jason Endfield called them “a wake-up call to those planning to further industrialise our seas in the name of renewable energy, and especially offshore wind farms”. In his view, it made no sense to increase ocean noise to levels that are “literally unbearable for marine mammals”.

The great cover-up of this environmental disaster continues with massive industrial parks being erected around the coasts of many countries. In the U.K., the incoming Labour government is committed to a massive expansion with the Mad Miliband spraying around billions of pounds in additional subsidies to boost an industry that would not exist in a free market.

To the fore in blowing smoke over the issue is Greenpeace USA’s senior oceans campaigner Arlo Hemphill who claims there is “no evidence whatsoever” connecting wind turbines to whale deaths. “It’s just a cynical disinformation campaign,” says another Greenpeace spokesman. The mainstream media often goes along with this narrative as shown by recent tweets from Agence France-Presse reporter Manon Jacob. He dismissed the focus on wind farms as a red herring “when offshore wind remains thus far marginal in the U.S. and scientific evidence of large marine mammal deaths is lacking”. This is the same Jacob who wrote a recent ‘fact check’ of the Daily Sceptic that was so bad and misleading it should feature in future journalism schools as an example of how not to criticise well-sourced material.

The investigative science journalist Jo Nova has a different take on the matter: “Researchers have known since at least 2013 that pile drivers were permanently deafening porpoises, leaving them presumably to die miserable deaths wandering blindly through dark or murky seas. Where were all the professors of marine science, paid by the public to know these things, and where was the BBC?” Spread the word, she continued. Fifty years ago, environmentalists would have raised hell about a thousand dead whales and dolphins. Now they are part of the cover-up. “They don’t want to draw attention to the blubber on the beach in case people start asking hard questions,” she observed.

There are however some signs that the ‘nothing to see here, guv’ line is starting to crack. A recent essay in Watts Up With That? suggested that an impact statement from the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) had finally acknowledged the harm caused by offshore wind farms. Examining leases off the New Jersey and New York coast covering over 488,000 acres, the BOEM hints that these developments are not entirely benign “despite being repeatedly framed as environmentally friendly solutions to the climate crisis”. Marine mammals, sea turtles, birds and fish could suffer due to noise, habitat displacement and changes in migration patterns, it is said. Even bats, says WUWT?, which are not typically associated with offshore environments, could be affected.

The essay noted that this latest BOEM work may signal a more cautious approach, “perhaps influenced by increasing legal challenges, public backlash, and even emerging scientific research indicating that wind turbines are not as harmless as once believed”.

Chris Morrison is the Daily Sceptic’s Environment Editor.

Press release: Net Zero could cost £300,000 per household

Costs exceed benefits many times over
New study from Net Zero Watch corrects significant flaws in earlier estimates.

With current technology, cost to 2050 is £10 trillion, and costs are ten times the benefits.
With most optimistic assumptions, cost is £7 trillion and costs are double the benefits.

From NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT

By Paul Homewood

London: 24 October 2024
Net Zero could cost £300,000 per household
  • Costs exceed benefits many times over
  • New study from Net Zero Watch corrects significant flaws in earlier estimates.
  • With current technology, cost to 2050 is £10 trillion, and costs are ten times the benefits.
  • With most optimistic assumptions, cost is £7 trillion and costs are double the benefits.

Net Zero Watch has published a new study that encompasses the first empirically based estimate of the costs of Net Zero, and the first cost-benefit analysis. Official estimates have been criticised as hugely overoptimistic and for failing to present a formal cost-benefit analysis.

The study is the first to consider the full variability of the weather and its effects on both supply and demand for energy, and finds that much larger capacities of wind solar and energy storage will be required to deliver Net Zero than suggested in any previous Net Zero cost estimate.

It is also the first to base its cost figures, where possible, on empirical data. Previous estimates have assumed that a renewables cost revolution has already taken place, a position that is refuted by the accounts of wind and solar farms.

The study takes in different scenarios of how technologies and their costs might develop as we head to Net Zero, as well as a scenario in which we abandon renewables and return to fossil fuels. Each also incorporates estimates of the harms caused by any remaining carbon dioxide emissions – the so-called social cost of carbon – to each scenario, so that the optimal approach can be identified.

In all cases, the cost-optimal approach is to return to fossil fuels, even once global warming harms are taken into account.

With current technology, the spend to 2050 would be nearly £10 trillion pounds, amounting to over £300,000 per household. The costs would be double the benefits – the reduction in global warming harms.

In the most optimistic scenario – in which Net Zero technologies are assumed to become very cheap and very efficient compared to today, fossil fuel prices are assumed to rise steadily, and a high cost is assumed for each tonne of emissions – the costs are still double the benefits. In this scenario, the UK still needs to pay out £7 trillion, or £250,000 per household.

Net Zero Watch director Andrew Montford, the author of the report, said:

These figures are horrifying, but should still be seen as conservative, because the study makes no attempt to find costs for hard-to-decarbonise sectors, such as aviation and shipping. It’s clear that the UK is on the road to economic ruin.”

In his foreword to the study, Lord Mackinlay said:

Britain’s political consensus, it seems, is to tax CO2 emissions at a higher rate than the damage they do and then spend trillions more subsidising technologies that the public would not choose without compulsion. This cannot be sustainable.”

The report can be downloaded here.

,Montford-CBAHerunterladen

BBC climate change output blasted as ‘ludicrous’–GB News

A new report from Net Zero Watch has exposed misinformation and factually incorrect reporting by the BBC on climate change.

From NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT

By Paul Homewood

Nice to see that GB News has pickep up and run with my latest BBC misinformation review:

A new report from Net Zero Watch has exposed misinformation and factually incorrect reporting by the BBC on climate change.

‘Tall Climate Tales from the BBC, 2023’ by Paul Homewood gives over 30 examples from last year alone showing how the public have been “misled”.

According to Net Zero Watch, a group that advocates for a balanced and open debate on climate change policies, the BBC is little more than a “lobby group” where climate change is concerned which is not providing fully impartial stories the public is entitled to.

In the annual report released on Wednesday, Paul Homewood outlines how the BBC use climate change as the reason ‘for everything from hot weather in Spain, to rare birds in England, to potholes in the road’.

Full story here.

The BBC have actually been forced to respond:

In other words, we cannot argue with any of the facts presented, but trust us anyway because we are cleverer than you!

Net Zero Watch warns of years of rising electricity bills

Net Zero Watch has warned that Labour’s plans for the electricity system mean that consumers face years of rising bills. Analysis by the campaigning organisation indicates that consumers could be paying over £500 per year extra.

From NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT

By Paul Homewood

London: 16 August 2024
Net Zero Watch warns of years of rising electricity bills

Net Zero Watch has warned that Labour’s plans for the electricity system mean that consumers face years of rising bills. Analysis by the campaigning organisation indicates that consumers could be paying over £500 per year extra.

The staggering increase is due to the Government’s plans to vastly increase renewables capacity, the cost of which far outweighs any possible savings from reductions in fuel usage in gas-fired power stations.

And Net Zero Watch is warning that government plans for a major deployment of floating offshore wind will make the situation even worse.

Net Zero Watch director Andrew Montford said:

Floating offshore wind is probably the most expensive form of electricity ever deployed on a commercial basis in the UK, and all the signs are that it will remain so.

Mr Montford said:

“Mr Miliband’s plans are not sustainable and will never be realised in practice. The only question is how much damage the Secretary of State will do to the country before Mr Starmer is forced to replace him.”

Notes to editors
  • The analysis is set out in a recent posting at the Net Zero Watch website.
  • Floating offshore wind has levelised costs of well over £200/MWh. Developers of new capacity are being offered £240 in the current renewables auction.
  • The impact on consumers would be felt partly through electricity bill increases, and partly through cost of living increases.