UK Gas and Electricity Crisis Looming

RevdTess · Post by **RevdTess** » 02 Jan 2006, 16:28

With France now saying that they're seeing a 25-30% drop in their supplies from the Ukraine, it'll be interesting to see how the markets react when everyone's back at work tomorrow.

Bandidoz · Post by **Bandidoz** » 02 Jan 2006, 22:54

johnhemming wrote: If it lasts until 12th Jan then it will coincide with a debate in the HoC about Gas Supplies which should be a bit of fun.

I'd like to know what contingency the Government has to cover the scenario where Gas supplies are chronically disrupted. It's an interesting paradox how those in the select committee were saying things like "there's lots of Gas in Canada/Russia (like 100 years' supply)" in the same meeting as "North Sea Gas has been depleting quicker than we thought". In other words, we're going to make the same assumption as the previous one which has since become disproved!

I would hope that, from our experience with Gas depletion, that to assume there's "plenty of Gas available for the medium term future" would be a folly, hence an acceleration of investment in renewables and nuclear would be in order. Is that not sensible?

In this context, the following news does not look good:
Link

Joe · Post by **Joe** » 03 Jan 2006, 10:59

Bandidoz wrote:In this context, the following news does not look good:
Link

<sigh> yeah, definitely a case of 1 step forward, 3 steps back.

Bandidoz · Post by **Bandidoz** » 03 Jan 2006, 13:58

Times Article Reported in Powerswitch News

Allan Asher, chief executive of Energywatch, said there was ?no excuse? for price increases and gave warning that companies would try to exploit the uncertainty in Ukraine to push prices still higher.

Somebody PLEASE educate this guy. Failing that, shoot him!

From the Times - "Where our gas comes from" (URL - http://images.thetimes.co.uk/TGD/pictur ... 537,00.gif)

Post by **clv101** » 03 Jan 2006, 14:38

Nice picture... so what happens when that 90% becomes 50% in a few years?

Russia have shown they are in control, they only have to control the margin in the same was Saudi Arabia could set the oil price in the past whilst only actually supplying ~10%.

Joe · Post by **Joe** » 03 Jan 2006, 14:41

Ah, but remember that we control the supply of football clubs going the other way

Post by **mikepepler** » 04 Jan 2006, 16:24

There's a warning on the national grid gas data page again now, for possible interruptions on 5th Jan to network sensitive loads:

http://www.nationalgrid.com/uk/Gas/Data/dsr/

Post by **clv101** » 04 Jan 2006, 16:29

Rather scary... it's not even predicted to be that cold on Friday anymore. Just wait until with have a few working days with average temperatures below zero, that's the trigger for disaster.

Bozzio · Post by **Bozzio** » 04 Jan 2006, 16:51

Looking at the National Grid data, it's amazing to see the big pink spike that forms over the Xmas week on the Demand Curve graph. Looks a little larger than normal - what's going on there? Scary, considering industry was shut down.

biffvernon · Post by **biffvernon** » 04 Jan 2006, 21:05

That spike was on the cold day, but industry was, as you said, shut down for Christmas, so the lights didn't go out.
Interesting to hear on Radio 4 Today Programme this morning Ian Fells saying "Oil...is at peak supply and it will be downhill from now on."

Post by **mikepepler** » 05 Jan 2006, 18:10

mikepepler wrote:There's a warning on the national grid gas data page again now, for possible interruptions on 5th Jan to network sensitive loads:

http://www.nationalgrid.com/uk/Gas/Data/dsr/

Well, that was a "medium" risk for 1 zone (whatever a zone is?).

Today it's "high" risk for 2 zones for 6th Jan!

Post by **clv101** » 05 Jan 2006, 18:16

mikepepler wrote:Well, that was a "medium" risk for 1 zone (whatever a zone is?).

Today it's "high" risk for 2 zones for 6th Jan!

Yet they are forecasting below normal demand for Friday... heaven knows what would have happed if was as cold tomorrow is it looked earlier in the week (hmmm, can one write in past tense about a future event!). The weather forecasts are a lot warmer now than they were a few days ago.

biffvernon · Post by **biffvernon** » 05 Jan 2006, 19:21

clv101 wrote:heaven knows what would have happed if was as cold tomorrow is it looked earlier in the week (hmmm, can one write in past tense about a future event!).

Yes, like this:

heaven knows what would have happed if were to be as cold tomorrow as it looked earlier in the week

fishertrop · Post by **fishertrop** » 10 Jan 2006, 08:24

West's humbug as Putin plays by our rules

Larry Elliott, economics editor
Monday January 9, 2006
The Guardian

http://business.guardian.co.uk/story/0, ... 92,00.html

As Paul Robinson noted in last week's Spectator, Egypt is seen as a friend of the west in the Middle East and gets plenty of financial help; Syria is no friend of Washington and receives less generous treatment. "Putin's policy certainly represents a very crude pursuit of national interest, implemented unilaterally and with little regard for international opinion. But, as such, it is not so very different from the sort of policies pursued by other states, including our own. Furthermore, the marketisation of energy policy which it involves is entirely in keeping with the demands that European states have been making of Russia for several years."
..
..
..
Instead, we're scrabbling around looking for a quick fix - urging Opec to pump more oil, building more nuclear power stations, occupying Iraq - in the hope that there is a magic solution to the problem of ever-rising demand and limited supply. There isn't. Russia's skirmish with Ukraine will be merely the foretaste of bigger and nastier conflicts over energy unless it is recognised that the party is over and the days of cheap oil and gas are gone for good.

Post by **mikepepler** » 18 Jan 2006, 16:02

Well, there I was thinking that we'd got away with the gas issue for this winter, with the next week forecast at 10C or so, but perhaps there's still time for a problem... February can often be a cold month, and there's this report to think about:
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid= ... PBTnMUnPlU

Natural-gas prices in Britain for delivery in February extended yesterday's gains, amid forecasts of falling temperatures that may increase demand in the European Union's biggest market for the fuel.

U.K. gas prices are rising as cold air moves in from Russia, where temperatures have plunged to a five-decade low. British prices for the fuel had fallen more than 50 percent in the past two months, when U.K. weather was milder than had been predicted.

``The penetrative cold freeze in Russia will spill across into central and western Europe, and the U.K. is going to get colder by the change of the month,'' Jim Dale, a senior forecaster with British Weather Services, said in phone interview today. ``February is going to be a colder month than January.''

Gas for delivery in February at the National Balancing Point added 11.3 pence, or 16.1 percent, to 81.25 pence a therm at 12 p.m. in London, according to the ICE Futures Exchange. The price equals $14.30 per million British thermal units. A therm is 100,000 British thermal units.