Soldato
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- 4 Aug 2007
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- Wilds of suffolk
Terrifying... So the suggestion is that Q4 of 2023 will hardly be much cheaper to Q4 of 2022
Yeah when you talk net bills after government rebate practically the same
Energy Prices (Strictly NO referrals!)
- Thread starter DXP55
- Start date
Yeah when you talk net bills after government rebate practically the same
As has been said state you'll put in an official complaint which should get it escalated, IIRC if you're on a prepay meter it's a different process to direct debit but they should have been either setting it up to automatically be applied when you top up, sent via a code via email/post, or just plain automatically applied if the meter doesn't require a physical token/card but gets updated over the air.
Which company are you with?
The April to July price cap uses the wholesale price from November 17th to February 17. Prices at the end of the last year were not so low, see chart below. The section highlighted in yellow is the April wholesale price cap price window.
The gas price now (about 130p Therm) is still 3-4x above normal price (early 2021 40-50p Therm)
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Terrifying... So the suggestion is that Q4 of 2023 will hardly be much cheaper to Q4 of 2022
The energy units prices will be cheaper in 2023 but remember - in Q4 2022 to Q1 2023, no-one was paying the real energy cost, as everyone was paying the Government subsided cost.
Now the Government are removing the subsidy, it appears like energy bills haven't reduced.
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Started a switch from British Gas to Octopus on Saturday, using a £50 referral link from a friend. Got a call from BG this morning offering me £75 to stay. Declined because they're an awful company and have regularly made billing and meter reading errors since I was forced over to them, but it was interesting that suppliers are suddenly feeling competitive again despite the caps.
Soldato
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- 25 Mar 2004
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- 15,985
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- Fareham
I wasn't aware they were doing this!
Octopus are really good on Twitter as well btw, usually reply to DMs within an hour or so, but lately more like 2-3, however you get someone who understands what you mean without having to explain it 50 times!
Think they've been a little busier thanks to Bulb merger and people switching over for the tracker rates.
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Soldato
- Joined
- 23 May 2006
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- 7,907
i wonder if the "big 6" are starting to worry a bit with the customers octopus are stealing... i just hope they do not over stretch. am sure they wont, they seem a well run outfit and generate a lot of their own power which am sure makes them a good profit to soften any other blows.
Man of Honour
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- 12 Jul 2005
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- Aberlour, NE Scotland
this is an impressive looking turbine blade. could do with some of those on our higher land
ignorant comment warning tho. is that really the best way to get them up there? what is the max load weight of say a Chinook chopper, could 2 of them not airlift them? (or is the air to thin at that altitude? )
Moment wind turbine blade is carried up steep mountain slope in China
Workers in China navigate a perilous path on a hillside road in Sichuan to deliver a 19-ton, 75-metre long wind turbine blade. It takes two weeks to transpor...youtu.be
If I remember correctly from my Heli-ops handling course our HC-2 (our version of the CH47-D Chinook) has a max lift capability of around 12000 lbs so one wouldn't manage it. I should imagine a pair would be a nightmare to sync if it was even possible. We used the Chinnoks down the Falklands for airlifting 40ft containers off the supply ships to supply food and other essentials to the mountain radar sites. As China is so friendly with Russia I am sure they could buy or borrow a couple of Mil-Mi 26 heavy lift helo's which can lift around 20 tons, even then that's only a ton over what the blade weighs and I would dread to think of what would happen if a gust of wind caught the blade during a lift.
Wind turbines are all well and good but the logistics of getting them to sites can be a nightmare. They promise cheap electricity but as long as the price of electricity is tied to the cost of gas we are stuck with high energy costs. The only ones seeing gains from wind farms are the owners who must be making massive profits from them at the moment seeing as the energy is produced for nothing once they have paid off the outlay for installing them. Maybe we should have a windfall tax on them as well.
I suspect we agree on the long term part renewable have to play. But for me at least, we need to being looking at an organic considered transition over this century, not what appears to be a rushed force virtuous migration over just a decade or so, along with associated poorly considered net zero affiliate goals.
Wind at times generates half the UK grid which is fabulous. So let's imagine we go to all the huge expense of not just doubling but trippling the number of wind farms along with all the costs of their maintenance and regular replacement. What happens when we have week(s) of little/no wind? At the moment we frequently have periods of single digit wind farm percentage contribution to the grid. How effective/cheap is that wind farm energy from three times our current units when it's only contributing <25% of the grid? Is that cost effective? Is that cheap? Especially then when you by necessity have to have to pay for a complete second parallel energy production system to fill in for it constantly.
As your comment ("the intermittency of generation") implies, when we can sensibly store energy that will help the transition. ie: When renewables can regularly preduce >100% of our grid demands, and that can then be stored for when later required, it will be a more viable - I don't see battery storage being practical so maybe potential energy storage (eg: damns/salt etc).
The April to July price cap uses the wholesale price from November 17th to February 17. Prices at the end of the last year were not so low, see chart below. The section highlighted in yellow is the April wholesale price cap price window.
The gas price now (about 130p Therm) is still 3-4x above normal price (early 2021 40-50p Therm)
That's useful. Thanks...
Also Ofgem updated their charts showing the historic view of the wholesale energy price, against the cap updates.
Source : https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/publications/ofgem-announces-latest-quarterly-price-cap-update
Soldato
- Joined
- 23 May 2006
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- 7,907
thanks... good to hear from someone with some actual knowledge to confirm my suspicion that my idea was a bit of a dangerous brain fart
(that said am not quite ready to give up on it yet... perhaps that monster turbine is out of scope for it, but maybe could be a way for slightly smaller turbines be transported - albeit on calm days.)
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didnt want to post again as its completely OT so this will likely go unnoticed but just appending here.
but in my lunch i have a nosey at the Mil Mi 26 and..... Jesus christ!.
Mil Mi-26 Helicopter, shows all its force when raising passenger plane ot Tupolev 134.
Nesse vídeo, veja o maior helicóptero de todos os tempos, Mil Mi -26, preparando-se para levantar um avião de passageiros de Tupolev 134. Força, destreza e p...
www.youtube.com
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Most of the offshore wind farms are signed up to Contract for Difference (CfD) contracts - which means when the price goes high (over their agreed contract 'strike' price), the difference is paid back, via a Government scheme.
This doesn't directly benefit home consumers, but is effectively a windfall tax going back to the Government.
For example :
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Soldato
- Joined
- 19 Oct 2002
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- Shakespeare’s County
Does that not make its a windrise tax? 
I wasn't aware they were doing this!
Octopus are really good on Twitter as well btw, usually reply to DMs within an hour or so, but lately more like 2-3, however you get someone who understands what you mean without having to explain it 50 times!
Think they've been a little busier thanks to Bulb merger and people switching over for the tracker rates.
Me neither, all the big suppliers seemed to act like they were hard done by (despite parent companies posting mega profits) and that the cap destroyed any ability they had to compete, so clearly that's not the case now. BG were never my choice to begin with, I only ended up with them when PFP collapsed. Glad to finally be getting rid.
Most of the offshore wind farms are signed up to Contract for Difference (CfD) contracts - which means when the price goes high (over their agreed contract 'strike' price), the difference is paid back, via a Government scheme.
This doesn't directly benefit home consumers, but is effectively a windfall tax going back to the Government.
For example :
Just to add to this - CfD does have a small edge reduction on customer bills. [Total about 1.5bn per year]
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Future sunny uplands cap estimates - The longer term Cap estimates 6 months out can still be very wrong, if you look at Cornwalls track record where they had been saying,
last august, £1K more for April, even with new market stabilization+backwardation mechanism included.
plus if winter 2023 is bad we'll burn through limited gas storage and lng delivery bandwidth.
and, visiting high security national grid control room, submitting short contracts for energy shortfall,
yesterdays show with mono-hull tidal turbine - never seen a picture before https://orbitalmarine.com/orbital-marine-power-launches-o2/ - Scott would have loved one (with engines)
last august, £1K more for April, even with new market stabilization+backwardation mechanism included.
plus if winter 2023 is bad we'll burn through limited gas storage and lng delivery bandwidth.
last weeks c4 guy martins power trip was most interesting programme I've seen from him - helping (manually) laying glass fibre for blade construction - did no one automate this ?
and, visiting high security national grid control room, submitting short contracts for energy shortfall,
yesterdays show with mono-hull tidal turbine - never seen a picture before https://orbitalmarine.com/orbital-marine-power-launches-o2/ - Scott would have loved one (with engines)
Man of Honour
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- 12 Jul 2005
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- 21,150
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- Aberlour, NE Scotland
I expect cost is a big factor in not using helicopters. It costs a lot of money to get one of these big helo's in the air and keep it there. The Chinook wasn't exactly reliable either. The number of times we had supply drops cancelled because the helo's were broke again was ridiculous. It would make things easier though. One of the big windfarms newar us caused weeks of chaos because of massively long lorries blocking roads that were simply not built to take them. In many places they had to widen and strengthen the roads so they could get around bends. That big American helo (Skycrane?) would be a good candidate for wind turbine transportation. if I remember rightly the Russians and Chinese are developing a huge heavylift helo as a joint project but that's most likely a long way off the prototype let alone production.thanks... good to hear from someone with some actual knowledge to confirm my suspicion that my idea was a bit of a dangerous brain fart
(that said am not quite ready to give up on it yet... perhaps that monster turbine is out of scope for it, but maybe could be a way for slightly smaller turbines be transported - albeit on calm days.)
Soldato
- Joined
- 23 May 2006
- Posts
- 7,907
will check out thanks
Cheers, just checked my February statement and the Alternative Fuel Payment is there.