Investing in wind energy makes absolute economic sense.
Europe’s ageing power plants need replacing. It makes economic sense to replace a growing proportion of those conventional power plants with wind energy.
This is because wind energy does the following:
- Creates jobs and economic growth in Europe. 238,000 people worked in EU wind energy in 2010.
- Reduces the cost of importing fossil fuels. Wind energy avoided €5.71 billion of fuel costs in 2010.
- Reduces the risks of Europe being dependent on other countries for its energy.
- Costs no more – and soon less – than conventional power sources. Today, production cost of a wind farm on land is broadly cost competitive with building a new coal or gas power station and the electricity costs are half of those from a new nuclear power plant. And that is in a situation in which some of the environmental and health costs of extracting and burning fossil fuels are not covered by power producers and therefore not included in the price of energy.
- Reduces the risk associated with rising fossil fuel prices.
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The European Union could achieve 100% renewable energy by 2050 “at the latest” if ambitious renewable energy targets for 203o are agreed, WWF has said in a new report.
By 2030 the EU could be generating more than 40% of its energy from renewable sources, said the report, Re-energising Europe: Putting the EU on Track for 100% Renewable Energy.
Based on research by Ecofys, the report provides policy makers dealing with the continued economic crisis a strong reminder that investing in wind power and other renewables while also agreeing to binding targets until 2030 makes good fiscal and environmental sense.
“Europe has significant untapped potential for cutting energy use and maximising indigenous power sources that could deliver cheaper and more secure energy,” said the report, which called renewable energy a beacon of hope.
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It seems that energy policy has never been such a hot topic – at least judging by the huge media attention it is now receiving.
Today, and this week generally, has seen a blizzard of European media coverage of energy policy – with wildly differing perspectives, and arguably also in quality of reasoning.
Today in Germany, Environment Minister Peter Altmeier is strongly criticised in the heavyweight Suddeutsche Zeitung for “misleading” statements on the cost of renewables. It is claimed he exaggerates the cost and is not helping his country’s transition from nuclear to renewable energy. Suddeutsche Zeitung accuses the Minister of creating uncertainty and fear.
In the UK the Daily Telegraph reports that an MEP has published a book attacking wind energy in Scotland. The newspaper highlights claims in the book about the amount of rental income gained by, often aristocratic, landowners from wind turbines erected on their land. The Times reported that “the MEP’s views remain outside the political mainstream north and south of the border”.
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UK P.M David Cameron
Wind turbines and other green technologies should be promoted as one way of dealing with climate change, British Prime Minister David Cameron said this week during a trip to India to encourage increased business ties with the UK.
“All over the world governments are not doing enough,” Cameron was quoted in the Guardian as saying. “We are not on track to deal with climate change and make sure our policies are sustainable.”
The newspaper also said Cameron told an audience in Mumbai that emissions-free green technologies like wind power are economic growth items.
The Guardian story added that Bloomberg New Energy Finance recently noted that India “now leads the world in clean tech investment growth, racking up $10.3 bn in the sector in 2011.”
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The European Parliament’s Environment Committee yesterday voted in favour of a proposal that will help to fix Europe’s ailing Emissions Trading System (ETS). The proposal could see surplus “permits to pollute” withheld from the market – a move which should push the carbon price up, providing polluting industries with an incentive to move away from fossil fuels.
“This is a good political signal showing that the EU still supports its carbon pricing policy. The ETS was designed to reduce emissions and level the playing field between fossil fuels and renewable electricity generation so that polluting technologies could finally be priced at their true cost to society. It has so far failed to reach these aims and today’s vote is a first step to fixing this,” Rémi Gruet, Senior Regulatory Affairs Advisor at EWEA, explained.
The current carbon price hovers around the €5 per tonne mark, but the current ETS – launched in 2008 – was designed around a carbon price of at least €25 per tonne. Since, the economic crisis has had the general effect of reducing carbon emissions meaning that thousands of carbon permits have been washing around the market at prices so low they no longer provide a reason to shift away from carbon-intensive processes.
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