These pages set out our wider thinking on issues relating to innovation, governance and practice for a sustainable, secure and affordable energy system.
New Thinking
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Lessons from America: Can the very different US Regulatory System Provide Insights for Energy Regulation in Britain/Europe?
Lessons from America: Can the very different US Regulatory System Provide Insights for Energy Regulation in Britain/Europe? Catherine Mitchell, IGov Team, 30th June, 2014 About Catherine: http://geography.exeter.ac.uk/staff/index.php?web_id=Catherine_Mitchell Europe’s 500 million (m) population dwarfs the US’s 320 m but the US, with its 50 States, has a far bigger pool of differing energy regulatory situations to experiment and learn from than Europe’s 25 countries; and the States have a far longer history of working together than Europe does. American, or specifically the USA (as opposed to Canadian or South American) energy regulation is, at first sight,
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New Thinking Blog: In Matters Of Climate Change, The Environmental Requirement Must Take Precedent Over Short Term Economic Goals
In Matters Of Climate Change, The Environmental Requirement Must Take Precedent Over Short Term Economic Goals Catherine Mitchell, IGov Team, 30th May, 2014 About Catherine: http://geography.exeter.ac.uk/staff/index.php?web_id=Catherine_Mitchell The Universities of Exeter and Leeds and the Met Office held Transformational Science: the future of climate change research following the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s (IPCC) Fifth Assessment Reports (AR5) on 15-16 May 2014. The results of all three Working Group reports were discussed: WG1, the science report, came out in September 2013; the Report on Adaptation in March 2014; and the Mitigation Report in April 2014. As Thomas
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New Thinking Blog: The Belly Of A (System) Architect
The Belly Of A (System) Architect* Matthew Lockwood, IGov Team, 27 May 2014 About Matthew: http://geography.exeter.ac.uk/staff/index.php?web_id=Matthew_Lockwood Twitter: https://twitter.com/climatepolitics Calls for some form of “system architect” for energy transitions, especially in electricity, are becoming more and more common. Recent examples come from Newcastle University, the Institute of Engineering and Technology, and the Smart Grid Forum. The Labour Party has also recently proposed a new Energy Strategy Board to guide investment in generation. This was also a common theme in a major conference on progressive energy governance held by the IGov team in London on Wednesday. There is clearly
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New Thinking Blog: Demand Side Response and Energy Supply (In)Security
Demand Side Response and Energy Supply (In)Security Caroline Kuzemko, IGov Team, 7th April, 2014 About Caroline: http://geography.exeter.ac.uk/staff/index.php?web_id=Caroline_Kuzemko Twitter: https://twitter.com/CarolineKuzemko Since the start of the latest Ukraine-Russia crisis the rhetoric of energy security has re-emerged as strongly as ever. What seems most evident this time around is the degree to which energy companies are deploying the energy supply security card in order to appeal for more state and political support for new capacity. The nuclear industry, never shy about letting a good energy crisis go to waste, has been active across Europe in using fear of Russia and
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New Thinking Blog: Bricolage – the way to speed up energy system change
Bricolage – the way to speed up energy system change Catherine Mitchell, IGov Team, 31st March, 2014 About Catherine: http://geography.exeter.ac.uk/staff/index.php?web_id=Catherine_Mitchell The second Working Group (WG2) report of the International Panel on Climate Change Fifth Assessment Review (IPCC AR5) has been published and says we, as a world, have to do more to combat climate change if we are to maintain the comfort and fabric of our lives, and it will cost us less than if we do nothing. WG1 of the IPCC AR5 was published last year on the science of climate change and in a
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New Thinking Blog: Energy Competitiveness in the Budget – Going for Cheap and Dirty, Not Lean and Clean
Energy competitiveness in the Budget – going for cheap and dirty, not lean and clean Matthew Lockwood, IGov Team, 21 March 2014 About Matthew: http://geography.exeter.ac.uk/staff/index.php?web_id=Matthew_Lockwood Twitter: https://twitter.com/climatepolitics Much of the discussion of Wednesday’s Budget will be about wins for pensioners and bingo players, but another winner was energy-intensive industry. Setting the background, the Budget text involved some fairly selective data and glided over a few inconvenient facts. Starting off by noting the key role that manufacturing is playing in the UK’s recovery, the Budget argued that: “As a vital export industry, manufacturers produce more than half of the UK’s exports,
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New Thinking Blog: Osborne’s Climate-Blind Budget Will Hit Clean Energy and Give Coal a New Lease of Life
Osborne’s Climate-Blind Budget Will Hit Clean Energy and Give Coal a New Lease of Life Catherine Mitchell, IGov Team, 19th March, 2014 About Catherine: http://geography.exeter.ac.uk/staff/index.php?web_id=Catherine_Mitchell Hardly a month has gone by since David Cameron told MPs he believed ‘man-made climate change is one of the most serious threats this country and this world faces’. Yet the Prime Minister’s newly rediscovered climate convictions has already failed their first test – in today’s budget. One of the few widely trailed measures which occurred today is the freeze to the carbon price floor at £18 a tonne of
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New Thinking Blog: Learning from Merkel’s approach to energy politics
Learning from Merkel’s approach to energy politics Matthew Lockwood, IGov Team, 10th March 2014 About Matthew: http://geography.exeter.ac.uk/staff/index.php?web_id=Matthew_Lockwood Twitter: https://twitter.com/climatepolitics Angela Merkel’s visit to London yesterday is being widely reported in the context of David Cameron’s efforts to secure EU reform.However, the presence of Europe’s electorally most successful leader is also a reminder of some contrasts between Germany and the UK in the area of energy policy. Germany’s Energiewende, or path towards renewable energy, has recently been much lambasted in parts of the UK press as disastrously costly. And it is true that support to renewable energy has cost Germany around four times as
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New Thinking Blog: Ensuring Trust and Transparency in the Electricity Market
Ensuring Trust and Transparency in the Electricity Market Catherine Mitchell, IGov Team, 28th February, 2014 About Catherine: http://geography.exeter.ac.uk/staff/index.php?web_id=Catherine_Mitchell Such is the life of an electricity nerd that pleasure can be gained from watching a spat between the Regulator Ofgem and the Labour Party. With no love lost between them, particularly since the Labour Party has said that they will replace Ofgem with a tough new energy watchdog, it was fun watching the press–releases ping out about transparency of prices on 26 February 2014. Ofgem had published actions to improve the transparency of energy company profits. While most
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New Thinking Blog: Lets Shine a Light on the Gas Industry – Update on Switching from BG
Lets Shine a Light on the Gas Industry – Update on Switching from BG Catherine Mitchell, IGov Team, 20th February, 2014 About Catherine: http://geography.exeter.ac.uk/staff/index.php?web_id=Catherine_Mitchell On 8 January, I wrote a blog about my experience of switching from British Gas (BG) as my gas supplier to Good Energy (GE). My gas was switched to GE at the end of December 2013 and I had rang GE on 2 January 2014 with my gas meter reading. As I said at the time, the Good Energy side of things was straight forward but: “This was not the case with
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