A 2015 investigation by the Competition and Markets Authority accused the UK’s energy suppliers of overcharging their customers to the tune of £1.4 billion a year.
Claire King and Matt Hill examine the applications of Ofgem’s ‘supplier of last resort’ process so far, and consider the implications for challenger companies and those taking on customers
Interconnectors are very useful things and can help reduce the costs of supplying power and balancing the system. But you have to consider what is at the other end.
The UK will have to be better at developing and exporting skills and products in future, when it loses the ability to treat the rest of Europe as a quasi-domestic market.
Commissioning of a new HVDC link between Scotland and the England/Wales transmission networks is set to reduce constraint payments by £90 million a year, according to National Grid.
The UK should add two further interconnectors to its plans to bring capacity to 17.4GW, according to National Grid.
Intergen has announced financial close and funding for Spalding Energy Expansion, a 300MW gas-fired plant in Spalding, Lincolnshire, which was awarded a 15-year capacity agreement in the December 2016 Capacity Market auction.
In his inaugural lecture at UCL in February, Michael Grubb, professor of international energy and climate change policy, argued that the “financialisation” of the energy industry has broken the link between markets and strategic investment.
Professor Michael Grubb argues that major capital-intensive energy assets such as nuclear power plants are effectively government projects and should be planned and funded as such (see box, p6).
The Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI) scheme has been “uncertain” value for money, the National Audit Office has concluded.