Renew On Line (UK) 57

Extracts from NATTA's journal
Renew, issue 157 Sept-Oct 2005

12. EU round up

EU Green Scenario

Strong support for renewables and energy efficiency in Europe could increase the contribution from renewables by 43% over the next 25 years and decrease greenhouse gases, according to the European Union. Primary energy demand in EU-25 would drop by 14% if the goal of 12% from renewables by 2010 was met- if it were combined with strong support for energy efficiency, according to ‘European energy & transport- scenarios on key drivers.’ The analysis examines the impact of oil and gas import prices, GDP growth, the potential role of nuclear, and “considerably faster penetration of energy efficiency and renewables, which for renewables occurs overwhelmingly during the period 2000-2010”.

With strong support for renewables and efficiency, total demand for energy among the EU-25 would drop 36% for solid fuels, 13% for liquid fuels, 18% for natural gas and 20% for nuclear, while renewables would increase 43.3%. By 2030, renewables would provide 243 million tons of oil equivalent (Mtoe), up from the 2000 level of 96 Mtoe, and move into third place behind liquid fuels (585 Mtoe by 2030 compared with 636 Mtoe in 2000) and natural gas 517 vs 376), and ahead of solid fuels (188 vs 303) and nuclear (148 Mtoe 2030 vs 238 Mtoe in 2000). The increased contribution from renewables would make CO2 emissions decline 23% from 3,665 MT in 2000 to 3,336 MT in 2020.

The report comments that “Most of the renewables penetration occurs by 2010, while the further penetration of RES is more modest in later years”, based on no changes to renewables policies beyond 2010. “To maintain momentum in renewables penetration, further policies are required for the post 2010 period. In the absence of such additional policies, underlying technology and market developments alone leads to the renewables share growing only from 12.1% in 2010 to 14.4% in 2030.”  The use of biomass has the great increase over baseline levels, while wind would grow by 46.8% in 2010 and 40.6% in 2030.

France blocks independent wind

The French National Parliament’s Committee of Economic Affairs, Environment and Territory has adopted an amendment which could mean the end of independent wind power in France. The amendment  means that only wind power installations with a capacity of less then 300 kW can benefit from France’s feed-in tariff- along with very big installations (between 30 and 50 MW) situated in specific new development zones which are to be defined later with a lengthy and uncertain procedure overseen by the Ministry of Energy.  The idea seems to be to tie windpower development to the French utility EDF, but equally it could be seen as way to sideline renewables in preference to its old favourite, nuclear power, which is EDF’s dominant source.  The European Renewable Energies Federation, has claimed that many local projects could now be abandoned, creating a heavy loss of investment and efforts and would endanger thousands of jobs in France and in other EU countries.

EU emission targets

The EU Environment Council of Ministers reaffirmed the EU’s commitment to limit global temperature increase to 2 degrees C, compared to pre-industrial levels, and initially agreed recommendations in line with the UKs existing commitment to reduce C02 emissions by 60% by 2050.  To achieve this, it said that the developed world would have to consider emission reductions of 15-30% by 2020 and 60-80 % by 2050.  But it didn’t set hard targets. Moreover, most member states are not complying with their existing targets and commitments e.g. to produce biofuels for transport, and there have been calls for a ‘green heat directive’. The European Renewable Energy Council noted: “Europe claims to be at the forefront of renewable energy worldwide but Europe is only at the forefront of developing renewable electricity technologies so far. Clear and coherent legislative action is needed in the field of renewable heating and cooling.”  They want  25% of this load to be supplied by renewables by 2020. 

EU Electricity Prices

Accenture consultants, say competition among utilities means that  UK consumers enjoyed the lowest  electricity price in the EU apart from Finland. Germany, Italy & Ireland had  amongst the highest.

*The EUs proposed Framework 7 research programme for 2007- 2013 allocates around Euro 6 bn for energy- 3bn to nuclear.