Energy Policy of The United Kingdom - Renewable Energy

Renewable Energy

The first targets for renewable energy, 5% of by the end of 2003 and 10% by 2010 'subject to the cost to consumers being acceptable' were set by Helen Liddell in 2000.

The 2003 Energy White Paper revised the established goals for UK renewable sources to 10% of electricity generation by 2010 and 20% by 2020, though by 2007 the then Energy Minister Malcolm Wicks indicated that by 2020 the figure has 'got to be somewhere between 10% and 15%'.

Subsequently the Low Carbon Transition Plan of 2009 made clear that by 2020 the UK would need to produce 30% of its electricity from renewables

Although renewable energy sources have not played a major role in the UK historically, there is potential for significant use of tidal power and wind energy (both on-shore and off-shore) as recognised by formal UK policies, including the Energy White Paper and directives to councils in the form of PPS 22. The Renewables Obligation acts as the central mechanism for support of renewable sources of electricity in the UK, and should provide subsidies approaching one billion pounds sterling per annum by 2010. A number of other grants and smaller support mechanisms aim to support less established renewables. In addition, renewables have been exempted from the Climate Change Levy that affects all other energy sources.

The amount of renewable generation added in the year 2004 was 250 megawatts and 500 megawatts in 2005. There is also a program established for micro-generation (less than 50 KWe (kilowatt electrical) or 45 KWt (kilowatt thermal) from a low carbon source) as well as a solar voltaic program. By comparison both Germany and Japan have photovoltaic (solar cell) programmes much larger than the installed base in the UK. Hydroelectric energy is not a viable option for most of the UK due to terrain and lack of force of rivers.

The government has established a goal of five percent of the total transport fuel that must be from renewable sources (e.g. ethanol, biofuel) by the year 2010 under the Renewable Transport Fuel Obligation. This goal may be ambitious, without the necessary infrastructure and paucity of research on appropriate UK crops, but import from France might be a realistic option (based upon the French wine lake).

In 2005 British Sugar announced that it will build the UK's first ethanol biofuel production facility, using British grown sugar beet as the feed stock. The plant in Norfolk will produce 55,000 metric tonnes of ethanol annually when it is completed in the first quarter of 2007. However it has been argued that even using all the UK's set-aside land to grow biofuel crops would provide for less than seven percent of the UK's present transport fuel usage.

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