Energy data reveals renewables surge
4 Aug 2015
The Department of Energy & Climate Change (DECC) published its annual Digest of UK Energy Statistics last week, with energy generation from renewable sources topping the bill.
Figures taken from the government report suggest renewables’ share of electricity generation rose from 14.8% in 2013 to 19.1% in 2014 to reach just under 65 TWh in total.
What’s more, energy generated from bioenergy sources was 25% higher in 2014 than in 2013, the report suggests – an increase that has been mainly attributed to the conversion of a second unit at Drax power station to dedicated biomass.
We can only hope that today’s statistics will help to focus minds and make the Government think again
RenewableUK’s Gordon Edge
However, in Chancellor George Osborne’s recent Budget, renewables, and in particular renewable electricity, was stripped of its exemption to the Climate Change Levy.
In response to DECC’s latest energy report, RenewableUK director of policy Gordon Edge said: “We can only hope that today’s statistics will help to focus minds and make the Government think again, so that they can come up with a balanced energy policy that includes encouraging investment in renewables rather than driving business away from the UK.”
According to the DECC report, efficient generation of energy was also a stand-out performer in 2014.
Indeed, the report reveals that some 54 new Combined Heat and Power (CHP) schemes were built last year, saving the UK economy roughly £250 million per year.
“These latest figures show business energy efficiency improves the productivity of the UK economy,” said Tim Rotheray, director of the Association for Decentralised Energy (ADE).
However, figures in the report suggest some industrial sectors saw limited new investment and some key industrial sectors saw significant reductions in CHP capacity and generation, ADE said.
According to the report, the downward trend does not stop with industrial CHP.
Figures suggest that UK refinery production fell by 7.8% from 2013 to 2014, a drop that is attributed largely to production losses amid the closure of the Milford Haven refinery and the closure of Coryton in 2012 – losses that are yet to be made up elsewhere.
Upstream production of crude oil and liquefied natural gas (LNG) on the UK Continental Shelf also fell by nearly 2% between 2013 and 2014, though DECC’s figures could yet be buoyed by industry body Oil & Gas UK’s latest provisional figures released this week in its Economic Report 2015 that suggest production in the North Sea could increase by 2.5% in 2015 – the first rise of its kind in 15 years.
Oil & Gas UK chief executive Deirdre Michie said: “It’s still early days, but initial indications suggest that production could increase this year for the first time in fifteen years.”
“Provisional data for the first six months of 2015 show liquids production to be up around 3% and net gas production to be up around 2.5% this year, compared to the first six months of last year,” Michie said.
According to Michie, production in the second quarter of the year looks particularly encouraging and early figures suggest that May saw the most oil and gas produced on the UKCS since March 2012.
“We will be able to discuss annual estimates with more certainty by the end of the summer maintenance season, as figures for July and August are historically the most uncertain,” she said.
