I bumped into a mate in Morrisons today who works for a company which provides electricity to small businesses. He said it’s going to more than double in October but then said just wait until next year. I then asked him what could he do to help them. Not a lot was his reply.
The whole energy crisis thing
Unbroken1 Nope. Wasn’t laying blame for the cost of energy at their door. It’s gross what the energy companies are doing, and the problem lays squarely with them. Personally I think we should’ve gone full tilt with expanding nuclear energy many moons ago, but the amount of red tape, political toing and froing, and “no to nuclear” protesting that’s dragged places like Hinkley Point into the quagmire has been painful to watch.
I was just pointing out where my sympathy lies more as a result of the above.
Wally Think I’m in agreeance with this. Just look at the rail network as an example. Privatisation was supposed to save it from ruin, but instead it’s turned into an utter shit show! Didn’t stop the prices skyrocketing in the process either.
Wally It makes the whole enterprise a cartel between providers where they can keep one upping on the price because….. why not…. Others will bump thier prices in tandem and the customer has no where to go.
“Because…why not?”…. how does that work then?
Nationalising energy providers wouldn’t help right now because the issue is high prices of energy (nat gas, oil, coal) at source.
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How many surveys do we need to conduct on nuclear power and shale gas extraction before we actually do anything? To ensure long term energy security, reliability of supply and affordable prices, we need a diverse energy mix which of course includes renewables and wind. We have ducked many tough, strategic decisions for fear of unpopular media headlines and look where it has got us.
mono-stereo exactly, the slow slide you don’t notice until you’re in that position too, and by that point it’s too late
The turkeys are coming home to roost for everyone.
If there’s a silver lining it might force more thinking about renewables and better choices.
Don’t see those ‘in power’ doing any such strategic thinking though.
As it is, nobody gives a fuck as long as they’re not personally inconvenienced.
Viva La Revolution
Was reading this about the green tax we pay as part of our bills:
https://fullfact.org/economy/green-levies/
This bit jumped out at me:
“While it is true that some of the money from these costs goes towards large-scale renewable energy projects, they are also used to fund a range of other environmental policies, including improvements to the energy efficiency of homes and business and Feed in Tariffs paid to households for surplus energy generated from renewable sources (like solar panels). ”
Am I being incredibly thick here, or is this claiming that the green tax goes towards paying for energy that people with solar panels sell back to the grid? So we are contributing towards the energy companies buying back energy, which they go on to sell again for profit. Is that what this is actually saying?
What are peoples thoughts on the following statement. ’We’ve had it too good for too long’.
It’s something I have heard from a couple of people over the last few weeks. The argument being that in comparison to the rest of the world we are have been living in relative luxury - we work, we earn decent money, we have leisure time, multiple leisure options etc. Maybe that has to end now and our resources go towards paying for needs rather than wants.
Any substance to that folks?
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Wally Christ Wally you ain’t half talking out of your behind… French energy prices are simply heavily subsidised - the tax payer foots the bill. And the problem with that is that no one makes an effort to cut consumption. If the whole world does that then there would be rationing and black outs - there’s only a certain amount of fuel to go around. So your nationalised utopia would never work…
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It’s absolute bollocks. The other line is “the days of cheap fuel and energy prices are over”
They’ve never been cheap - the profits these companies make (circa £1b a day on average over the last 50 years) shows this.
The other driver of high fuel prices is decarbonisation. Government policy is now directed against carbon fuels, which means no new investment by the private sector in these sectors and therefore limited capacity. You get a shock like Russia invading Ukraine and the shit hits the fan.
It’s a fucking pointless exercise at this stage in the game. We’re all fucked and we may as well just get on with it now.
The warnings were ringing out for the last 50 odd years and nobody gave a fuck until it was too late. Now it’s just a means of extracting yet more cash and taxes from us, paying lip service and nothing more
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Jules72 Yes dingus. The tax payer should foot the bill in the UK too. That’s what nationalisation is.
There are a myriad of ways to reduce usage without ripping the souls out of the population.
Edit : are you suggesting we should be happy to subsidize other nationalised countries over here?
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You do have question the if the ceo’s of these large energy companies sleep at night knowing that the high prices that they are charging could cause people to starve or cause massive health problems and lot’s of businesses will go under.