Banned installation of oil fired boilers and natural gas heating »
Since 01 January 2013, the installation of oil fired boilers and natural gas heating in Denmark is illegal.
Our lignite-fired power plants now produce almost a tenth of all electricity consumed in Germany and have shown again that they can be an active partner of renewable energies, balancing their volatile output, helping to stabilize the grid,” according to the head of Vattenfall Europe Mining and Vattenfall Europe Generation, Hartmuth Zeiss.”
— Platts
More regulation or better regulation
EU Commissioner Oettinger yesterday at #CEER annual conference: “We need less politics in energy regulation and more means for regulators”
— Dirk Van Evercooren (@DEvercooren) January 30, 2013
French are French no more?
Recent article of MIT Technology review discusses the potential nuclear phase-out in France.
Since when the French are following others (Germans in this case) and not going their own way, the french way? :)
Few facts:
- France produces more nuclear energy than any country other than the United States
- 3/4 of electricity produced in France are from nuclear power plants
- if renevables are volatile in electricity production, nuclear is the opposite, steady “base” production
The article points out some interesting remarks if such phase out would occur:
- what happens with the knowledge and business of Areva - national energy company: Chinese are getting the knowledge from US are planning to build nuclear power plant in 43 months, Westinghouse is also big in China The
- Commissariat à l’énergie atomique has been spending about 1.5 billion euros ($2 billion) annually on R&D into “nuclear technologies of the future.”
- spent-fuel reprocessing technology is on the way and the french are leading in this segment (Gates’ venture is also developing such technology). -> this technology could help minimise past, present and future radioactive waste
Article is available here.
Renewables are increasing *regulated* fees around the world
While the price of electricity might decrease due the production from wind and solar (German Energy Transition), the price of *regulated* network cost are increasing. So, in fact the electricity is being re-regulated and the impact of market (supply and demand) on the overall price minimised.
A flat fee is introduced in Arizona for the utility to recover losses incurred by people producing their own energy i.imgur.com/Fi0OXtZ.jpg
Viscous circle of decentralised production with the ever increasing network fees.
Network fees are regulated with aim of covering maintenance of the electricity grid. Due the RES subsidies they were increased across Europe to cover these subsidies, which resulted in increased implementation of solar and wind. However the grid was built for centralised production and it needs upgrade in order to secure the flow decentralised electricity. But with local producers consuming part of their production for their own needs, also the overall fee gathered will be lowered. Hence the fees (per MWh) will have to be increased.
EU network code process key according to Platts
You wonder why some EU energy projects are late?
The EC can make the codes binding by gaining approval from an EU committee of national government officials, a process known as comitology. There is no deadline for achieving comitology approvals.
Better to do incremental steps than none?
The conditions for bundling cross-border gas capacity, known as “the sunset clause”, were particularly controversial. The EC originally wanted to force all cross-border capacity to be sold as bundled capacity within five years of the code becoming binding, which could have forced companies with existing long-term unbundled capacity contracts to renegotiate them before they expire.
EC refers Bulgaria Estonia, UK to EU Court over energy package
The EU needs an internal energy market to tackle Europe’s energy and climate challenges and to ensure affordable and secure energy supplies to households and businesses,” EU energy commissioner Gunther Oettinger said in a statement. “Delays in implementation of the EU internal energy market rules have negative effects on all players and are therefore not acceptable.
Platts
The European Commission and Russian Gazprom have dropped plans for a memorandum of understanding (MoU), allowing Gazprom access to 100% capacity on the Ostsee-Pipeline-Anbindungsleitung (OPAL) pipe that links with Nord Stream for six months, the Commission told ICIS on 16 January. 2009 decision of the German regulator Federal Network Agency (BNetzA) involved conditional exemption of OPAL from EU access regulations. It stipulated that if Gazprom and/or its affiliate Wingas booked more than 50% of exit capacity on the pipe at the Czech border, it would have to conduct a gas release programme of 3 billion cubic metres (Gm³)/year. Total OPAL capacity is 30Gm³/year.”
— ICIS
Croatia sign agreement on Croatian section of South Stream
Gazprom, Croatia sign agreement on Croatian section of #SouthStream #gas pipeline
— Platts Gas (@PlattsGas) January 17, 2013
