Energy companies' stranglehold

www.theguardian.com/environment/damian-carrington-blog/2013/sep/30/george-osborne-green-economy-stupid

An interesting article for you to read.

I have never heard anything quite so ridiculous. In fact, it nearly made me swear!
The one thing Ecotricity/ Vince Dale is is honest. Before you criticise you ought to look at the website and see how honest the company is.
They list their fuel mix for every year from April 09 to March 2013.
The last financial year their renewable fuel was 67.5%, with 1.7% nuclear. The national average for renewable is 11.3% with 20.6% nuclear.
What they have also said is that from 1st August 2013 they have taken their fuel mix to 100% green electricity, for every unit of electricity that their customers use, they now source a unit of 100% green electricity.

Tell you what, Flickety, you are only allowed to have 11.3% renewable, and you have to have 20% nuclear in your mix. Is that okay?
And whoever does not want to pay the green taxes is not allowed to have any renewable electricity.
They have a very good chart on the Ecotricity website showing you exactly when gas, oil and coal reserves run out.
Oh, and my fuel charges are frozen until the end of the year. I believe British Gas have said theirs are going up by 8% soon.

Cartels are illegal. If there was any suggestion that the energy industries had one the Office for Fair Trading would be on them like a ton of bricks. I think a couple of British Airways staff did a couple of years in prison for entering a cartel with Virgin Airlines. They got away with it because they reported it. However if one power group puts its prices up the others will follow, they do not need to reach any agreement.

Frankly after hearing an interview with Ecotricity on You and Yours this morning, I think the company is hypocritical. The interviewer asked them what they did if they could not meet the demands of their customers at any given time because they were not generating enough power from renweable sources. Their spokesman replied 'we buy on the spot market'. That means they buy in electricity generated by power stations using hydrocarbons and nuclear fuel to supply to their customers.

I think if people sign up to companies like ecotricity because all their power is, supposedly, generated renewably, if the power is not being generated they should have their electricity supply cut until the renewable resources start generating again.

All the main electricity suppliers have a renewable obligations. All of them own wind turbines. Tilbury power station has recently converted to burning wood from renewable resources and the Drax power station in Yorkshire is to do the same. The Didcot A coalfired power station burnt up to 10% biomass before its recent closure. I buy my power from a company that is honest about producing power generated both renewably and by conventional means.

Yes there is an obligation on the energy companies to spend the money on renewables. The school I used to work with got a fancy new boiler, fuelled by chippings from eon. It should save a lot of money over the years. They have also been obliged, for a very long time, to put money into energy efficiency measures for householders. But they have been criticised for the way they have implemented this at times.

Ana

Precisely.

If Miliband wants to 'freeze' energy prices, why would he not go on and on and 'freeze' food prices, petrol etc. It sounds wonderful, until you seriously give it some thought. I am putting another slant on such a scheme and saying he may just be shooting us all in the foot.

The supermarkets are vying with each other to cut the petrol prices at the pumps 'to reflect the drop in wholesale prices', they say.

They do this every so often, don't they?

Iam 64

VAT has possibly no chance of being reduced for a long time.

Rachael Reeves, Labour Minister, said quite clearly that VAT would not be reduced under Labour. Why, because the economy is picking up. It was also mentioned 'I believe' at the Labour Conference last week !

Just a quick thought. It was said on Murnaghan this morning, "We should be looking at how to reduce energy bills, not keeping them high". I immediately thought about yesterday when we filled up with petrol. The petrol was 3 p lower than the week before. So I am now pondering on that comment too. All very confusing.

Are these green taxes ring-fenced? More likely they just go into the general coffers. Those least able to afford it are paying a larger percentage of their income on fuel and to support these dubious taxes.

And the idea that the energy companies would leave the UK is laughable - they're making huge profits.

Yes pogsit makes business sense, but if a politician wanted to put the screws on...
The thing about cutting VAT I suppose is that it would cost the gvt a fortune, but pressuring the energy companies is free.

Jendurham - I agree, it'd be wrong to cut the green payment but right to cut VAT.

Not quite sure how Ecotricity would stand on that. They pay £280 per customer per year to build wind turbines and research into renewables.
I willingly pay that.
Why not ask the government to cut the VAT on fuel; that's 5%.
I'd rather pay green taxes than VAT. At least I know what I'm paying for.

JessM

I am not arguing with any comment you have made. A lot of companies charge you less for using DD don't they, not just energy companies. I don't agree with that principal but I suppose I admit to understanding why they do it.

What about the high price paid by those with meters pogs ? Is it fair that those of use who pay by DD get charged less?

JessM

I did say I 'believe' it was 11%. There is quite a difference between our posts. It is a figure I have seen in print and heard on TV but I admit to not being sure, hence I wrote 'I believe'. You could well be right.

The point I was making is , is there a possibility Green Taxes could be looked at being removed from energy bills as I believe it has a damaging effect on the least well off in particular, given they have no choice but pay it.

Where do you get that figure of 11% pogs. The current of issue of Which magazine quotes 4% of average bill to promote investment in low carbon energy.

Iam64

It can't be overlooked that Miliband was Energy Minister between 2008-2010. He brought in the Climate Change Act which unbelievably caused our energy bills to rise at a faster pace than they have done over recent years. It is the inclusion of these 'Green Taxes' in our bills that are a big problem.

Maybe I fall behind the argument that 'Green Tax' costs should be removed from our energy bills. Why, because they have affected the poorest in society who 'have' to pay for gas and electric. This would be an immediate reduction on our bill and we would know more how much profit the energy companies are making.

Green levies I believe account for 11% of our bill.

Now where the 'Green Tax' levy should passed onto is a question that needs serious debate.

Agreement with Tegan's point about competition. The rise in energy bills in the past 5 years or so has been so far ahead of inflation and I believe they could only do this if the 6 major companies formed a cartel to ensure their prices were similar.

I was just reminding everybody that this could possibly be a good thing to check out now. She said to watch out for companies who freeze your cost but charge a 'get out' fee. I haven't to be fair looked at this myself yet.

I don't think there is competition because my paranoia tells me that the energy companies have a cartel and all work together [watched too much Dallas in my youth perhaps].

Interesting comment on 'Your Money' today (BBC). Freeview 80.

They had as their guest a woman called Anne Robertson or Robinson from U.Switch.

She said she couldn't understand why Labour have said they would freeze energy bills for 20 months, why, because you can freeze your bill right now and for a longer period of time than Labour have announced. What an excellent point. She said in her opinion competition is best for the market. I didn't think about that.

Of course, N Power give you so much money back each year so, if you switch from them you have to make sure it's just after you've had it. Crafty they are.

Delabole was the first wind farm I ever saw and I found it an amazing sight, although the original ones were very noisy I believe and it would have driven me bonkers if I lived there [I used to live not far away at one time]. Delabole also used to have the best fish and chip shop in the world until it changed hands. Going to check out Ecotricity; daft question but I assume it's still the same process if you have, say, a gas leak?

Good Energy sounds okay as well. I particularly like the idea of them building Delabole windfarm instead of a nuclear power station.
Checked it out and Ecotricity is cheaper for me. My last bills were cheap anyway because I was in hospital for 3 weeks, then went to stay at my son's for nearly three months. I do not feel guilty as I bought their combi boiler and they haven't paid me back yet.
Tegan, you've just reminded me that my boiler needs servicing.

Don't have a combi boiler and have always had a large immersion heater so we used to heat the water overnight for the next day. Always planned to use the washing machine, dishwasher and tumble dryer at night but never did. Only recently realised that it made my daytime rate higher [and, of course, when my heating packed in last year I was using electricity to heat the water again for a while] and didn't realise that it was a simple process to stop it. May be that my energy bill dropped last year because I had no gas for ages and was, in fact, freezing cold for quite a long time. Mind you, as a nocturnal person, now I'm retired [hurrah] I might revert back to sleeping all day and regret switching. But, not being at work also means I may have to keep the house warmer during the day. Better buy some thermals methinks....

Ah so no storage heaters in the plot tegan - why on earth were you on E7 in the first place then? (being nosy now)
We get ours from Good Energy jen