Energy Prices

[Captain Howdy]

Shaping up to be a boss decade this.

[Rico1304]

3 hours ago, Harry's Lad said:

Just out of interest, is it possible to get a replacement display, the ones you plug in so you can keep an eye on your usage?

If you call your supplier they’ll send one. 

[Rico1304]

3 hours ago, Harry's Lad said:

Just out of interest, is it possible to get a replacement display, the ones you plug in so you can keep an eye on your usage?

If you call your supplier they’ll send one. 

[Rico1304]

Or two. 

[Elite]

"Your supplier is gonna send you a replacement, a replacement."

[Rico1304]

It’s a quirk of both the gas and electricity act that anyone can install their own meters. You’re obliged to send readings to your supplier and keep it safe but it’s possible. 
 

I once considered setting up a business providing meters for the tin foil hat brigade who don’t want smart meters.  

[Harry's Lad]

1 hour ago, Rico1304 said:

Or two. 

Any advance on two?

Thanks mate, I'll give them a ring in the morning.

[Mudface]

1 hour ago, Rico1304 said:

It’s a quirk of both the gas and electricity act that anyone can install their own meters. You’re obliged to send readings to your supplier and keep it safe but it’s possible. 
 

I once considered setting up a business providing meters for the tin foil hat brigade who don’t want smart meters.  

If they don't give you cancer and send your internet history to the NSA, you'd be onto a winner.

 

I didn't get one because some utter wanker tried the hard sell on me a year or two back, obnoxious Geordie cunt. I'm also not really convinced they're of much benefit to me. It's not as though I'm going to stop cooking something halfway through because the meter's ticking over like some sort of warp drive, or banning cups of tea because they cost too much. Although binning my lad's XBox and wife's hairdryer might be fun.

[Rico1304]

32 minutes ago, Mudface said:

If they don't give you cancer and send your internet history to the NSA, you'd be onto a winner.

 

I didn't get one because some utter wanker tried the hard sell on me a year or two back, obnoxious Geordie cunt. I'm also not really convinced they're of much benefit to me. It's not as though I'm going to stop cooking something halfway through because the meter's ticking over like some sort of warp drive, or banning cups of tea because they cost too much. Although binning my lad's XBox and wife's hairdryer might be fun.

You might not change your consumption, but you will be able to benefit from TOU tariffs and the fact your meter readings are being collected and used by your supplier. 
 

One of the biggest issues suppliers have is that customers think ‘right, I’ve agreed £100 a month’ and then proceed to have the heating  on all day with the back door open because it’s too hot.  The £100 is based on the answers to questions you provide or previous consumption.  Getting that message across has been virtually impossible.  

[Bjornebye]

2 hours ago, Elite said:

"Your supplier is gonna send you a replacement, a replacement."

Hahahaha he doesn't look that much unlike Rico in real life ! 

[George Costanza]

If your energy supplier can obligate the contract you are currently in then its fine for you.  Most won't be able to do so (particularly smaller companies) they will have agreed 1-2 year fixed rate contracts which they can no longer afford as wholesale prices to the UK have quadrupled throughout 2021. These companies either honour these low price tariffs they originally agreed thus selling gas cheaper than they can currently buy it at or they declare bankruptcy & void all current contracts. Those with voided contracts will then need to enter into new contracts at a much higher rate. This was raised & warned about prior to Brexit but as usual dismissed as scare mongering.

 

The CO2 problem could well yet eclipse the gas energy price hike as well.

[KMD7]

I blame Putin. 

[dockers_strike]

12 minutes ago, KMD7 said:

I blame Putin. 

He's a contributing factor In part. It's a perfect 'storm' of events that doesnt help the consumer.

 

Russia is clearly only supplying its contracted minimum gas to Europe. All the electric interconnectors between the UK, Norway, France, Ireland and a few other places are working but in times of famine, not everyone shares their food as they did it times of plenty.

 

Ireland suspended the Moyle supply to Scotland due to its own energy shortage for a short time and I gather a fire in the South East took out one interconnector with France.

 

Asia has snapped up a lot of the LNG supplies and low seasonal winds have left windfarms becalmed.

 

The decision by BG(?) to close the Rough gas storeage facility under the North Sea was absurd.

[Rico1304]

7 hours ago, dockers_strike said:

He's a contributing factor In part. It's a perfect 'storm' of events that doesnt help the consumer.

 

Russia is clearly only supplying its contracted minimum gas to Europe. All the electric interconnectors between the UK, Norway, France, Ireland and a few other places are working but in times of famine, not everyone shares their food as they did it times of plenty.

 

Ireland suspended the Moyle supply to Scotland due to its own energy shortage for a short time and I gather a fire in the South East took out one interconnector with France.

 

Asia has snapped up a lot of the LNG supplies and low seasonal winds have left windfarms becalmed.

 

The decision by BG(?) to close the Rough gas storeage facility under the North Sea was absurd.

No they aren’t, there was a fire in Farnham last week that’s impacted one from France and it won’t be back to capacity for months.  
 

BG owned rough but it was closed for a while for safety reasons then mothballed. 
 

You’ll know Steve Cunningham then, Nick Goddard &  Scott Flatters. 

[PestiRed]

Bunch of bedwetters on this thread. Boris has already announced that he’s going to fix everything so I don’t know what you’re all panicking about

[Anubis]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[dockers_strike]

Vladimir Putin has his finger hovering over Europe’s light switch. 

Kremlin critics, and now even the International Energy Agency, have accused Russia and state producer Gazprom of restricting supply to Europe, helping to fuel the surge in gas prices across the region. 

The Kremlin has added to these suspicions by offering a simple solution to the feared winter shortage: approve the controversial Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline that will tighten Putin’s grip on European energy supply. The pipeline, which bypasses Ukraine and is vehemently opposed by the US, is finally ready to pump gas into Europe but is awaiting approval from German regulators.

“Get Nord Stream 2 operational or else: that’s in the end the signal they sent,” says Prof Andreas Goldthau at the Institute For Advanced Sustainability Studies.

“Typically over summer Gazprom pumps a lot of gas into Europe, not because it’s needed, but because they replenish gas storage facilities, which they have all over Europe.

“You fill up the storage and you start to stock draw in the winter. What has been happening over the summer is the Russians didn’t do that.”

Whatever the Kremlin’s intentions, soaring gas prices ahead of the winter is threatening to add to building inflationary pressures and damage Europe’s post-Covid recovery, particularly in Germany and Spain. A number of factors other than Russia are worsening Europe’s gas price crisis from freak weather in South America to higher demand in Asia.

Jacob Nell, Morgan Stanley economist, warns the gas price crisis could hit growth in Europe by squeezing disposable incomes and hurting energy-intensive businesses.

He says the price surge risks becoming more damaging if Russian supply fails to pick up following the approval of Nord Stream 2 or “a cold winter with high gas and power demand”.

The gas price crisis has revealed the fragility of the region’s energy supply and the need to beef up resilience. Governments across Europe have rushed to soften the blow on consumers with multibillion-euro packages to protect households.

Europe is heavily dependent on Russian gas for energy – and is set to become even more reliant as Nord Stream 2 arrives.

The EU imports more than 40pc of its natural gas from Russia amid warnings that it needs to diversify its energy supply. The next largest supplier, Norway, holds far less clout, providing just 16pc, according to Eurostat, the bloc's official statistics body.

Spain, Greece and Italy have three-quarters of their energy needs met by imports and Germany has seen its dependency climb, rising from 59pc in 2000 to two-thirds of its supply in 2019. Germany is the biggest consumer of natural gas in Europe, accounting for a quarter of its energy needs.

However, gas storage in Europe’s biggest economy is just 62pc full ahead of the winter when demand will pick up, according to Barclays. That is almost 30 percentage points below the normal average for the end of September and the bank’s analysts believe bringing Nord Stream 2 online will do little to boost Europe’s supply this year. 

“There’s a lot of politics going on,” says Jason Durden, head of energy markets at Alfa Energy, who adds that Germany had been caught between Moscow and Washington. 

“Russian-owned storage within Germany is low and partly that will be the whole Nord Stream 2. You might interpret that as political pressure.”

He says Germany’s industrial sector is “particularly exposed”.

“This is huge for industry and particularly for Germany, less so for the UK… Energy intensive industry cannot operate at these levels so it closes down.”

German and Spanish households are the most likely in the eurozone to be squeezed by rocketing prices. Electricity and gas make up a larger proportion of the two countries’ inflation baskets, meaning their consumers are more affected by any rise or fall in prices. Spain has also suffered one of the biggest jumps in electricity spot prices.

Capital Economics expects higher energy bills in Spain to add 0.5 percentage points to inflation in the coming months, pushing its cost of living gauge above 4pc to turn the screw on households.

“Governments are stepping in to cushion the blow, but higher energy bills are a downside risk to the eurozone’s consumer recovery,” says Jessica Hinds, Europe economist at Capital Economics.

“While rising energy prices won’t derail the consumer recovery, they may still prove a headwind.”

European governments are intervening to stave off a winter crisis that squeezes struggling families and ailing suppliers. 

Spain signed off on emergency measures that will redirect €2.6bn of profits at energy firms to cap gas prices and provide help for consumers. Madrid has warned the EU that the surge in prices threatens to cause a backlash against the transition to renewables after the country was hit by waves of protests against higher energy bills.

France has unveiled a €100 one-off energy grant to help almost 6m low-income households meet their bills while Italy is also said to be mulling billions of euros of aid.

Analysts are warning that another cold winter could keep prices high well into 2022, keeping up the pressure on inflation. Winter is coming and a cold chill is set to descend on households and governments across Europe.

 

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2021/09/22/putins-iron-grip-energy-leaves-europe-increasingly-vulnerable/

[dockers_strike]

3 hours ago, Rico1304 said:

No they aren’t, there was a fire in Farnham last week that’s impacted one from France and it won’t be back to capacity for months.  
 

BG owned rough but it was closed for a while for safety reasons then mothballed. 
 

You’ll know Steve Cunningham then, Nick Goddard &  Scott Flatters. 

But you seem to agree with everything I posted there. Rough has been closed. It was closed for safety reasons then deemed uneconomic. Does it matter the reason, the storage facility isnt used, end of?

 

I mentioned one interconnector to France was off line due to an incident. All others are working. Moyle was closed down when the Republic needed all of its energy. As far as Im aware, there's no other issue with it. If you think Putin isnt restricting gas into Europe then that's up to you my friend.

 

[Rico1304]

Just now, dockers_strike said:

But you seem to agree with everything I posted there. Rough has been closed. It was closed for safety reasons then deemed uneconomic. Does it matter the reason, the storage facility isnt used, end of?

 

I mentioned one interconnector to France was off line due to an incident. All others are working. Moyle was closed down when the Republic needed all of its energy. As far as Im aware, there's no other issue with it. If you think Putin isnt restricting gas into Europe then that's up to you my friend.

 

I haven’t mentioned Putin.  
 

You said the decision was stupid. It was uneconomical for Centrica to maintain rough. The government could have intervened as it was national infrastructure. 
 

You said they were all working then said one wasn’t.  So they weren’t all working.

 

You also got loads wrong about SMETS.  But  other than that you were spot on.  

[dockers_strike]

23 minutes ago, Rico1304 said:

I haven’t mentioned Putin.  
 

You said the decision was stupid. It was uneconomical for Centrica to maintain rough. The government could have intervened as it was national infrastructure. 
 

You said they were all working then said one wasn’t.  So they weren’t all working.

 

You also got loads wrong about SMETS.  But  other than that you were spot on.  

You quoted my posts where I stated contributing factors and said 'No, they arent.'

 

Are you now telling us all the decision to close Rough storage facility whether on safety or economic grounds leaving the UK with just 2% storage needs isnt stupid?

 

Sorry, if you want to go down the rabbit hole of semantics about me saying 'Hey, all the interconnectors are still place and working except Moyle was stopped and one to France is out of commission.....' knock yourself out.

 

Are you denying SMETS was costed at the thick edge of £1.4bn, the cost will be bourne by the consumer on their bills, SMETS wont save the consumer anything, SMETS1 didnt delivery full functionality, the enrolment of SMETS1 to SMETS2 wont be completed until September 2022 at the earliest? I could go on but apparently, because Im not on company time, I dont know what Im talking about. Yeah, whatever. Keep taking the company shilling.

[Rico1304]

35 minutes ago, dockers_strike said:

You quoted my posts where I stated contributing factors and said 'No, they arent.'

 

Are you now telling us all the decision to close Rough storage facility whether on safety or economic grounds leaving the UK with just 2% storage needs isnt stupid?

 

Sorry, if you want to go down the rabbit hole of semantics about me saying 'Hey, all the interconnectors are still place and working except Moyle was stopped and one to France is out of commission.....' knock yourself out.

 

Are you denying SMETS was costed at the thick edge of £1.4bn, the cost will be bourne by the consumer on their bills, SMETS wont save the consumer anything, SMETS1 didnt delivery full functionality, the enrolment of SMETS1 to SMETS2 wont be completed until September 2022 at the earliest? I could go on but apparently, because Im not on company time, I dont know what Im talking about. Yeah, whatever. Keep taking the company shilling.

I’m saying it wasn’t Centrica’s responsibility to maintain national infrastructure at a loss. You are the one making broad statements.  I’m just pointing out where you are wrong. 
 

S1 was never planned to have the full interoperability of S2.  Hence, well, S2. The uptake of SMSO services didn’t go as planned and NCSC adding years to ensure the security of national infrastructure wasn’t foreseen. 
 

But all the ancillary benefits like TOU, same day switching, data quality and driving down cost to serve are tangible.  There’s an argument on whether this rollout should have been supplier or network led, but BG lobbied hard and got their way.  
 

Stockport is shut now, they’ve moved production to Vietnam. I prefer going to Vietnam than Bird Hall Lane. 
 

Oh and I don’t work for BG. Haven’t for 3 years now.  
 

[stringvest]

26 minutes ago, dockers_strike said:

You quoted my posts where I stated contributing factors and said 'No, they arent.'

 

Are you now telling us all the decision to close Rough storage facility whether on safety or economic grounds leaving the UK with just 2% storage needs isnt stupid?

 

Sorry, if you want to go down the rabbit hole of semantics about me saying 'Hey, all the interconnectors are still place and working except Moyle was stopped and one to France is out of commission.....' knock yourself out.

 

Are you denying SMETS was costed at the thick edge of £1.4bn, the cost will be bourne by the consumer on their bills, SMETS wont save the consumer anything, SMETS1 didnt delivery full functionality, the enrolment of SMETS1 to SMETS2 wont be completed until September 2022 at the earliest? I could go on but apparently, because Im not on company time, I dont know what Im talking about. Yeah, whatever. Keep taking the company shilling.

you don't know what you're talking about.  

 

1.  SMETS will cost far more than 1.4bn. 

2.  SMETS will save the consumer billions, as it will save the industry the need for unnecessary spend on capacity.

3.  SMETS1 delivered the functionality it was designed to deliver. 

4.  'SMETS is at the behest of energy companies'.  That would provide genuine belly-laughs amongst a significant proportion of the energy industry. 

 

Seriously, you need to accept that Rico and I understand this aspect of the industry in a way that you could not do.  That's not a personal slight, it's just a fact.  

[Rico1304]

Long read. 

 

The crisis facing the energy sector is a serious one. At it’s most fundamental level sits the trilemma of the energy sector: 1) certainty of supply, 2) at low cost, 3) whilst reducing carbon usage.  Pick any 2 of the 3 you want, but you cannot have all 3. 

Whichever one you forfeit is not a good message if you are a politician and thus intervention was required: competition was (artificially) encouraged and the price cap was introduced.

Let’s start with the latter. That cap is set in regular intervals based on wholesale gas prices at that time and that works OK(ish) when the price of gas drops or is flat which it has been up until recently. However it doesn’t work when prices go up rapidly as they have now done. Essentially gas now costs £10 but you can only sell it for £8. 

That could of course been avoided if energy suppliers had hedged and locked in the price of gas. However, that would have come at a considerable cost at the time of taking out the hedge but, given the price cap, those cost could not be appropriately passed onto the customer at that time. Thus, the price cap is a disincentive to hedging.

Now I get to the first point, artificial competition, which has exasperated the whole situation. In order to create competition in the energy market, capital requirements were reduced, and green levies waived for smaller energy firms. As a result we saw a huge wave of new entrants. Many of them without the history, experience and credit standing to put in place the right hedges. Many of them mainly focussed on topping the price charts on the comparison sites which is of course easier if you don’t have the cost of the hedge.

So, how do we get out of this mess? 

In the immediate term we have to deal with the issue that gas costs £10 but we can only sell it at £8. I saw the Business Secretary on Sky News this morning saying that the consumer would not pay for it, nor the taxpayer. I cannot see how that math works. We are £2 short and someone has to pay for it. It will be the consumer, directly or indirectly.

In the longer term 2 things have to be done in my view. 

First of all, regulatory and political intervention must be more considered, less populist, and more longer term. That is not easy as often good policy is bad politics, and vice versa.

Secondly and finally, the only way out of the trilemma is to go green much faster. Out of its 3 components, 2 are glass balls that will shatter when dropped, 1 is made of rubber and will bounce back. Whilst politically unpalatable that rubber ball is price. We are going to have to accelerate investments in green, clean energy. As you go through those huge investments prices will go up, but they will go down again once you get there. 

Unpopular but necessary.

 

[Elite]

Full of hot air this thread.

[Rico1304]

Avro have just gone.