{"id":257393,"date":"2023-05-14T15:13:33","date_gmt":"2023-05-14T13:13:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=257393"},"modified":"2023-05-14T15:13:36","modified_gmt":"2023-05-14T13:13:36","slug":"energy-security-fossil-fuel-dependence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=257393","title":{"rendered":"Energy Security & Fossil Fuel\u00a0Dependence"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From Climate Scepticism<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

By JIT<\/a><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

An issue that we hear about increasingly is energy security. The oxymorons in government broke off a bit of DBEIS (they liked to call it \u201cBays\u201d rather than \u201cdebase\u201d for some reason) to form DESNZ, the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero, whose titular motives are firmly at cross purposes. The mooted successor is supposedly DUNCE, the Department for Unicorns and No-Carbon Energy. (Whenever I see DESNZ written down, my brain makes a connection to the word \u201cdenazify,\u201d but that\u2019s just me I guess.) My advice to our government is that renaming things generally does not help. It just confuses everyone. MAFF survived for a long time (50 years?) before there was DEFRA. After that, departments have split and merged and been renamed at an accelerating rate, almost as if making acronyms was their ultimate purpose. From DEFRA was born DECC, which gave rise to BEIS, and now Denazify, I mean DESNZ. But I digress. What about the actual stats? These are as the previous edition in this series taken from Energy Trends tables available here<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

1. Energy security; import dependency<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Since 2010, DECC and its successors have reported statistics on the UK\u2019s import dependency. How much of our energy are we reliant on other countries for, and how has this changed over time? Well, we flipped from a net exporter to a net importer in 2003:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

After 2013, the worst year (so far) when we depended on imports for 48% of our energy, things have settled down to a stubborn mid to high 30s percent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another way to look at this is to have exports and imports on the same figure. The net is closely similar to the import dependency percentage in the form of the graph.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Energy demand has not gone up; in fact it has gone down. Our increasing demand for imported energy came not from a rapacious hunger for more, but from a withering of home-grown production \u2013 coupled with an overall decline in energy use. From 2001, the consumption of energy in the UK has gone down quite markedly (-25% ish). Some might call this a success story based on improved efficiency. I think it is more likely a tragedy of deindustrialisation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

In fact if you look at the energy consumption by sector over the past half century, it\u2019s clear that energy use in industry has gone down quite markedly. It is now at about a third of the level it was in 1970. Domestic consumption meanwhile has stubbornly resisted attempts to cut it. Perhaps those attempts are bearing fruit for individual dwellings, but there are now more dwellings, so the net decrease is small.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

2. Fossil fuel dependency<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

The other critical indicator of our energy system\u2019s performance is supposedly our dependence on fossil fuels. Two statistics are presented in Energy Trends: the \u201clow carbon\u201d share of energy, and the \u201cfossil fuel dependency\u201d of energy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The two proportions do not add up to 1, because net imports of leccy and the contribution of \u201cnon biodegradable waste\u201d are not included in either.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Those with an eagle eye might be thinking that there is something missing even so. That certainly seems to be the case: here, burning woodchips and waste for electricity counts as low carbon. Together they make up about 10% of overall energy consumption in the UK. So depending on whether you believe they are low carbon sources of energy, the low carbon share is either 20.1% (DESNZ\u2019s preferred figure), or 11.0% (excluding energy from waste and bioenergy).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is possible to argue the toss on whether burning rubbish and\/or woodchips is \u201clow carbon.\u201d I don\u2019t think it is, since it emits carbon dioxide at the point of generation \u2013 that\u2019s fairly obvious. The other low carbon generators like wind turbines might have plenty of carbon dioxide emissions along the way, but when they actually turn wind into leccy, they don\u2019t produce any.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So to my way of thinking at least, the UK\u2019s energy system is 11% of the way to Net Zero.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There is of course another minor issue, which is that the embodied carbon dioxide in imported goods is not counted as energy. However, it used energy in its creation, and that energy was unlikely to be \u201clow carbon.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

3. Dispatchable vs. Non-Dispatchable Electricity<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

One factor that the stats bods at DESNZ do not find time to dwell on in their time series is how our electricity generating mix has evolved towards weather-dependent sources. The following figure shows that we are increasingly dependent on the whims of Aeolus for our juice. Non-dispatchable is wind and solar; hydropower is counted as dispatchable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Conclusion<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

As the North Sea gas fields have begun to deflate, our dependence on imports of energy has risen to worrying levels. We have also made little progress towards \u201cdecarbonisation\u201d, unless you count burning trees as a low carbon enterprise. I find myself wondering, if so little has been achieved after so much pain: will we ever see the farthest shore?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Featured image<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Dall.E: A pylon being struck by lightning<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

An issue that we hear about increasingly is energy security. The oxymorons in government broke off a bit of DBEIS (they liked to call it \u201cBays\u201d rather than \u201cdebase\u201d for some reason) to form DESNZ, the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero, whose titular motives are firmly at cross purposes. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":121246920,"featured_media":257404,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","_crdt_document":"","advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[691818076,691819548,691818154],"class_list":{"0":"post-257393","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","6":"hentry","7":"category-uncategorized","8":"tag-co2","9":"tag-decarbonisation","10":"tag-net-zero","12":"fallback-thumbnail"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/0WordPress-Image.webp?fit=2000%2C700&ssl=1","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paxLW1-14Xv","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":375637,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=375637","url_meta":{"origin":257393,"position":0},"title":"Katy Perry Slammed for Climate Hypocrisy Over Trip to Space","author":"uwe.roland.gross","date":"04\/18\/2025","format":false,"excerpt":"Katy Perry Is Being Called A \u201cWalking Oxymoron\u201d After Fans Uncovered A Decade-Old Video Of Her Urging People To Protect The Planet Against \u201cMan-Made Climate Change\u201d","rel":"","context":"In \"Climate change\"","block_context":{"text":"Climate change","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?tag=climate-change"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/016ST-KATY-PERRY-NOTEBOOK-cqmf-superJumbo.webp?fit=1200%2C800&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/016ST-KATY-PERRY-NOTEBOOK-cqmf-superJumbo.webp?fit=1200%2C800&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/016ST-KATY-PERRY-NOTEBOOK-cqmf-superJumbo.webp?fit=1200%2C800&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/016ST-KATY-PERRY-NOTEBOOK-cqmf-superJumbo.webp?fit=1200%2C800&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/016ST-KATY-PERRY-NOTEBOOK-cqmf-superJumbo.webp?fit=1200%2C800&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":273920,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=273920","url_meta":{"origin":257393,"position":1},"title":"The Elephant in the\u00a0Room","author":"uwe.roland.gross","date":"08\/16\/2023","format":false,"excerpt":"Today\u2019s Guardian online includes an\u00a0interview\u00a0with Jonathan Brearley, the Chief Executive of Ofgem, a position he has held for just over three and a half years. 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He frames the policy as essential for the \u201cjust transition,\u201d arguing excessive fossil fuel dependence is the real long-term security risk. 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