The UK aims to produce 15% of its energy from renewables by 2020. Alok Jha of The Guardian explains the technology behind the target (16th July 2009)
What is renewable energy?
Anything that can be used to make heat or electricity without unsustainable fuels and which does not make a net contribution of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere. This includes wind power, waves and the tides, solar energy, geothermal energy and biomass. Nuclear power, although it is low-carbon, cannot be counted as a renewable source of energy because its fuel, uranium, is finite.
What are the UK’s commitments on renewables?
The UK is committed to producing 15% of its energy from renewable sources by 2020 — this is equivalent to around 35% of its electricity.
What are the leading technologies?
The UK has huge resources in wind and wave power and, in the first of these, has done relatively well to ramp up development and installation.
By 2007, there were 2GW of turbines installed. The British Wind Energy Association (BWEA) says 9GW of offshore wind will be in place by 2015, overtaking installed nuclear power. This month, Centrica and RWE npower came close to approving two offshore wind farms costing an estimated £3bn.
According to the Centre for Alternative Technology, wave power could supply 10% of the UK’s energy needs but this technology is at a much earlier stage. Although there are scores of British designs for wave energy converters, none are anywhere near commercial scale.
The biggest tidal project on the cards is at the mouth of the Severn river. This has the second highest tidal range in the world, and the government is consulting on a range of projects that could harness the energy. The plans preferred by the government, which include a large 10-mile barrage across the river, have dismayed many environmentalists. Bristol-based group Stop the Barrage Now say that the largest barrage would add to local flooding, reduce fish stocks, damage bird life and destroy the Severn bore, the tidal wave that flows up the river. They also argue the development will ruin mudflats across an area of more than 77 square miles.
Many green groups favour tidal lagoons, which have lower impact but are unproven technologies. These artificial lagoons flood as the tides rise and then trap water as the tide falls. The water then passes through a hydropower turbine to generate electricity.
Solar technologies include photovoltaics or PV, where sunlight is used to create electricity directly and solar thermal, which can be used in small set-ups to heat water for homes. Concentrating solar power plants focus sunlight from hundreds of mirrors onto a central tower, where water is superheated into steam that can turn turbines and make electricity.
Geothermal energy involves tapping the heat stored underground – traditional methods harnesses naturally occurring pockets of steam or hot water that rise from deep underground, bringing with them the energy stored by the rocks there. Enhanced methods allow those traditional techniques to be applied almost anywhere by drilling deep into the Earth and pumping water into the hole, the underground hot rocks fracture, allowing the water to circulate and be heated.
What is the progress globally?
The UK still only gets 1.8% of its energy from renewables, according to government figures. EU figures for 2005 show that, in Sweden, the renewable share was upwards of 40% and Finland’s was around 30%. Denmark got more than 20% of its electricity-generating capacity from wind power thanks to consistent support ion the technology from the government. Germany gets 5.9% of its energy from renewables, largely thanks to a feed-in tariff for solar energy, which pays consumers a premium rate for any electricity they feed into the national grid.
According to the Renewable Energy Policy Network (REPN), global power capacity from new renewable energy sources (excluding large hydro) reached 280,000 MW in 2008 – a 16% rise from the 240,000MW in 2007.
Green energy investment overtook fossil fuels in attracting investment for first time last year, according to the United Nations. Wind, solar and other clean technologies attracted $140bn (£85bn) compared with $110bn for gas and coal for electrical power generation, with more than a third of the money destined for Britain and the rest of Europe. The biggest growth was in China, India and other developing countries.
What is the UK’s problem?
Some people blame the market, others argue that the government has not been bold enough in tangible, long-term support for renewables industries. Since the 1980s, the government has been keen not to pick winners in technology terms and has created non-specific incentives such as the renewable obligations certificates (ROCs) to encourage renewable technologies. The problem is that this has only encouraged low-risk renewables such as onshore wind.
What plans are there for the future?
The REPN says that, as of 2009, at least 73 countries have renewable energy policy targets and, in response to the financial crisis, many governments are spending their economic stimulus funding towards new green jobs the renewable energy sector can provide. In the US, part of the economic stimulus package will invest $150bn over 10 years in renewable energy. South Korea has ear-marked 81% of its stimulus package worth £23bn to green measures.
China is planning a big increase in its use of wind and solar power in the next decade — officials there believe it could match Europe by 2020, producing a fifth of its energy needs from renewable sources. In the current development plan, the goal for wind energy is 30GW but the government is thinking about increasing this goal to 100GW by 2020.
In the US, the Waxman-Markey bill recently proposed a tentative agreement to create a renewable power target of 15% by 2020.
The UN believes $750bn needs to be spent worldwide between 2009 and 2011 although the current year has started with a 53% slump in first quarter renewables investment to $13.3bn.
What are the commercial opportunities?
The government reckons that the low-carbon environmental goods and services sector was worth £3,046bn in 2007/8. Asia accounted for 38% of this total, Europe 27%, and the Americas 30%. In the UK, this sector was valued at £106.5bn, making it the world’s sixth largest low-carbon and environmental economy, with 3.5% of global market share.
The report went on to forecast up to an additional 400,000 jobs over the next eight years, many of these in the renewable energy and new low-carbon industries. Just taking these sectors alone, the market value of low-carbon technology and services could be £127bn in 2014/15, employing 1.04 million people.
According to the Carbon Trust, the UK could benefit from 250,000 jobs and up to £70bn in revenue from offshore wind and wave technologies by 2050. But this potential will only be realised if the government gives clear signals to industry, so that investors know where to put their money, rather than leaving new technologies to face the market alone. It would need investment of up to £600m into research, the removal of regulatory barriers and incentives to increase the deployment of the turbines. In the UK this means installing around 29GW of wind by 2020 and upwards of 40GW by 2050. A large part of the economic benefit would come from exporting technology developed here.
For wave, the outlook is more modest. Around a quarter of the world’s wave technologies are being developed in the UK and the Carbon Trust said Britain should be the “natural owner” of the global market in this area. It could generate revenues worth £2bn a year by 2050 and up to 16,000 direct jobs
