Boris promised today that offshore wind farms could power every home by 2030. It has naturally attracted a lot of attention, but the promise is not quite as revolutionary as it sounds!
For once Harrabin has a factual article here:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-54421489
He notes that the new pledge raises the target for offshore wind from 30 to 40 GW in 2030, something which was already in the manifesto.
40 GW gives about 120TWh, or a third of total generation, equivalent to consumption by domestic users. This is a common trick used by the renewable lobby, “powering x-thousand homes”, conveniently ignoring all the non domestic users of electricity.
We already have about 25 GW of offshore wind, either operational or in the pipeline up to 2026. The last CfD round added 6GW alone, so getting to 40GW is not pie in the sky.
Indeed Labour’s manifesto last year promised to increase offshore capacity to 52 GW by 2030.
Whether bidders will come forward to build all this new capacity at acceptable prices is another matter.
via NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT
October 6, 2020 at 11:36AM
Iowa Climate Science Education 