LIVE: Greenpeace activists shut down Centrica HQ

Posted by petespeller - 30 April 2012 at 7:09am - Comments

Giant energy bill outside Centrica offices

Is your energy bill as big as this?

This morning 50 Greenpeace volunteers shut down the head office of British Gas owners Centrica using the world's biggest energy bill.

We're there to tell Centrica to end its dangerous addiction to expensive and polluting fossil fuels. It is time to get off the gas price rollercoaster and start investing in clean, renewable energy and energy efficiency to bring bills under control and tackle climate change.

Take action now to tell Centrica to end the energy rip-off!

Follow the live updates here or join the conversation using #energybills

Article tagged as: british gas, centrica, direct actions, energy, energy bill, energy efficiency, renewable energy

Comments Commenting is now closed

Perhaps one of the really questions is

What price for Green Energy?

Building Offshore Windfarms is not cheap - £1bn for 250MW with a 40% load factor - Bargain?

Building New Nuclear - £3bn for 1800MW with a 85% load factor - Bargain?

Bulding New CCGT - £700m for 1000MW with up to a 80% load factor - Bargain?

Alternatively how much have you done to reduce demand

Change all your bulbs? Increased your insultation? Turned the temperature of your central heating down to temperature like 16 and put a pullover on?

By Energy Worker - 30 April 2012 at 11:57am

Centrica are expecting the supply of gas to shrink, i.e. by 2013-2014 they expect 'the global over-supply of gas to disappear.' Yes, they invest in other energy sources too (very little though), but have recently been lobbying politicians to persuade the government to use more gas and less renewables in the energy mix, and not to establish new pollution standards for power stations. Centrica has also been trying to persuade the EU to water down binding commitments on reducing energy demand. So, Centrica know that gas supply will reduce, but don't want demand to fall or alternatives to be increased in the overall mix. Aside from continued reliance on carbon-intensive power generation, the outcome of this (i.e. increased use of a reduced resource) must be to raise prices. It's a green issue and a social one (as all are).

As for some of the (mostly anonymous, though I really couldn't care less about IP addresses etc) Greenpeace-bashing points:

* An action at offices that also house the renewables team might be ironic on some level but has nothing to do with the issue at hand - they just happen to be in the same place.

* Of course Greenpeace has paid staff but most people on actions are volunteers and will have taken days off from their non-Greenpeace jobs to do this.

By Dave Hubble - 30 April 2012 at 11:59am

ghytred - "Replace Gas with Renewable electricity? Not going to happen overnight."

Ok, but given what is at stake, given the scale of the job and the tight deadlines are you saying that what you have done at Centrica is the best that you could have done so far? Let's be truthful, if the desire was truly there a company with Centrica's resources could have moved mountains by now.

The truth is that strategically there is more profit to be made extracting maximum profit from a dwindling resource than there is investing in the future. By the time that equation changes it will probably be too late for us all.

By Adam Walker - 30 April 2012 at 12:01pm

A straw poll in the office today (not Centica BTW) would suggest that blockading the offices of a company that invests in providing reneable energy may not have been the best move.

It also suggests that you were better off spending the money provided to you to help save the planet would be better spent buying another boat and biothering some more whales, rather than people trying to earn a living.

Note, these are not just my opinion, but those of my colleagues too. We filled out a form and called ourselves a focus group, which makes it as scientific as anything you've done.

And, the whale should have been called Mr Splashypants.

By MonkeyFaceJones III - 30 April 2012 at 12:15pm

Perhaps the government should come up with some serious proposals! We have solarePV panels on our roof and solar water heating, its great, we have virtually no gas bills in the summer,and most of our electricity we use is produced and the rest is sent to the grid. The thing is not everyone can afford them, they should be built as standard on all new houses.

This makes sense enviornmentally and financially. Also for all those sceptices that dont think Climate change is happening, it would make a cleaner more pleasant world!

By Evie Sier - 30 April 2012 at 12:20pm

Adam Walker -

Forget Gas for the moment, just think about electricity. Grid say they need to spend 10's of billions upgrading infrastructure over the next 10 years to cope with the expected change of generation mix - meaning renewables - so they can transport power from where it's generated to where it's used.

That's just one of the problems. Centrica can't fund that It's a huge problem for the country, and Centrica is doing what it can but that really isn't much on a National scale. That's why we talk to government, to try to work out solutions that government, industry, and customers can all live with.

Now for Gas. We invest a very large amount in exploration and production - don't know how much, sorry - as Gas supplies 4 times the energy that Power does. So to convert all that Gas to electricity you, Mr Customer, must go out and buy a new boiler and possibly Cooker which don't use gas. How can Centrica arrange that, let alone multiplying the total generation plant in the UK by 5, and giving the Grid the capacity to carry it all?

I don't know what the solution is.

By ghytred - 30 April 2012 at 12:20pm

ghytred - "I don't know what the solution is."

Thank you, neither do I.

I do appreciate the debate and I absolutely take on board that this isn't Centrica's sole responsibility and there are huge infrastructure issues that every one is running scared off.

I do object to Centrica / British Gas profiteering from the uncertainty.

By Adam Walker - 30 April 2012 at 12:37pm

To various respondents - I don't think anyone is suggesting that the transition from a fossil-fuel dependent system is an easy one (the concepts are, but the politics isn't), but it is essential in order to reduce carbon emissions. However, Centrica's lobbying is pushing in exactly the opposite direction, trying to keep the energy mix focused on gas even though the company knows (and has admitted to Government) that it is a dwindling resource, and at EU level trying to prevent moves to reduce demand. Of the 'Big Six' energy companies, Centrica built the least renewables
capacity during 2007-11, and even tried to blame renewables for price
hikes, despite renewables accounting for only £25 out of an average
yearly energy bill of about £1300, while £100 of the £150 annual bill
increase (yup, just the increase) over the last year alone is due to
gas. So, not only is Centrica not even trying to improve this situation, it's actively working to make things worse (despite having a small % investment in renewables). So, Centrica's current course of action can only lead to increased carbon emissions and increased bills. THIS is why Greenpeace have taken the action they have. It's unsurprising that Centrica staff aren't impressed, but unfortunately it's ultimately due to irresponsible policies from Sam Laidlaw etc at the top which, if not changed, will lead to far more serious problems than a bit of inconvenience at Centrica HQ and some NGO-bashing on the Greenpeace website.

By Dave Hubble - 30 April 2012 at 12:51pm

We’ve basically got a three pronged challenge ahead of us. How do we minimise the rise of fuel bills whilst doing our bit to tackle climate and ensuring we’ve got secure supplies of energy for the future?

Centrica seem to be wedded to future heavily reliant on gas, on the basis that gas plants are cheap and quick to build. But the fuel isn’t free, and as both analysis for OFGEM, and research by the Committee on Climate Change, has highlighted, it’s the volatility of the international price of gas that is the main reason why bills have been spiralling out of control recently. The IEA and OFGEM both project that gas prices will likely continue to rise in coming years. It’s crucial then that we reduce the extent to which the UK bill payer is exposed to the roulette of the international gas market so that we can stabilise the cost of energy. Building homegrown renewables and investing in efficiency helps to reduce this reliance on an unpredictable international market. It also helps us take the carbon out of our energy system, generate new, much needed jobs and provide secure energy at a cost that is predictable.

With that in mind, we think that Centrica should take the following three steps:

Step 1:

Publicly declare its support for the recommendation of the Committee on Climate Change (CCC) that the UK should have almost completely decarbonised our electricity sector by 2030.

Step 2:

Declare its support for a regulatory limit on carbon emissions from power stations – known as an emissions performance standard – that is in line with the with recommendation of the CCC that we should decarbonise the power sector by 2030, and that standard should apply to all polluting fossil fuel power stations, not just coal ones.

Step 3:

Support an outcome from this year’s Electricity Market Reform process that prioritises support for renewables and energy efficiency measures that can bring get bills under control and bring down pollution levels.

By petespeller - 30 April 2012 at 1:04pm

2 people agree

Just look at the top five comments on this blog post. This protest is a farce. I will also be withdrawing my financial support from Greenpeace. This is the latest in a chain of badly executed, badly researched, and ultimately pointless actions.

By ex-Greenpeace Supporter - 30 April 2012 at 1:19pm

Bloody hell, it's a tough day in the office.

"Audrey Bob....Centrica hardly "sets the price"...it's a market driven price"

Er.. yeah.. wholesale prices but then Centrica Energy can add what they like to it.

By Audrey Bob - 30 April 2012 at 1:56pm

"Just look at the top five comments on this blog post. This protest is a
farce. I will also be withdrawing my financial support from Greenpeace."

Look out, incoming toys! What's the betting you were never a Greenpeace supporter in the first place.

By Audrey Bob - 30 April 2012 at 1:59pm

@tinkerbelle I think you'll find Pete isn't one of the activists at the action - hence him being able to respond to you on the website. As a Greenpeace activist myself I can assure you none of us get paid to take part in non-violent direct actions. However every organisation needs staff to make it run and since I'm assuming Greenpeace is against slavery they do pay those people.

@adamwalker Putting "fact" next to something doesn't make it true.

Well done to all the Greenpeace activists making a stand today for what they believe in. People thought Gandhi was anoying once too! You're tomorrow's heros!

By Esther Freeman - 30 April 2012 at 2:04pm

2 people agree

"Forget Gas for the moment, just think about electricity."

over 30% of electricity is generated by gas. Nearly 50% of UK gas supply comes from imports and is due to rise substantially in the next couple of years.

By Audrey Bob - 30 April 2012 at 2:16pm

@Energy Worker: Why should everything be a bargain? Even if renewable energy is more expensive (not mentioning the reasons why) how does that mean we should continue on the path we are? Fossil fuels are linked directly to war, so is nuclear - even more so due to the materials involved. You are happy to get cheaper fuel under whilst doing so as a result of war than you are to pay more for something that doesn't cause wars?

By Audrey Bob - 30 April 2012 at 2:19pm

Esther Freeman -

er, not quite with you? If fossil fuels are not sustainable then it is a 'fact' that a viable alternative is required, which is what I said, wasn't it?

My point was that you can get emotional about the argument either way, but the fact is we need to be building a new energy future and it doesn't seem to me that anyone has made much of a start yet.

By Adam Walker - 30 April 2012 at 2:28pm

Why dont you protesters go get a bloody job! it's so hard for me to come into work in my 6.0L V8 mother nature friendly Vauxhall monaro and keep it running in the car park all day while i work, so it doesn't get cold, when you stop us working, which means i now have to go badger baiting instead, how inconsiderate can you get?

Get a life, get a family, GET A JOB!!!

By gas guzzler - 30 April 2012 at 2:29pm

Gah! How dare you woolly liberal dogooders stop me from having to go to a 2 hour meeting about VAT! I was really looking forward to that! Now I'm going to have to 'work from home' instead.

By Miss Gruntled - 30 April 2012 at 2:42pm

I can't quite work out which side of the argument Greenpeace is on here and am mystified why this company or any similar one has been targetted. Centrica is playing a major role in deploying "alternative" energy sources. This has been made possible by the distorted market which induces suppliers of "alternative" energy (wind, photovoltaic and chicken-poop) which requires the Centrica and other power distributors to pay hugely expensive prices per kilowatt-hour to any supplier who buys into the scheme by generating energy by expensive technology, whether by pounds per kilowatt-hour, or by interest payments on initial capital cost, or subsidies. Whilst such schemes might be economic in sparsely-populated windy or sunny areas with long distances to their national grids (if any), in the densely-populated UK this is either economic suicide or racketeering. Now whilst Centrica may or may not originally have been involved in lobbying (by Greenpeace) for setting up this distorted market (via the Climate Act 2008 and related crazy ideas), it can hardly been criticized, least of all by Greenpeace, for participating in the scam which is not merely legally allowed but legally required. At the moment the UK is sitting on top of hundreds of years of cheap carbon-based fuel, yet has been forced by Greenpeace, the WWF, the IPCC and the UN to "quarantine" this asset indefinitely, based on wholly bogus claims that carbon dioxide is a pollutant, that the Earth's temperature is going up, and that it is human production of carbon dioxides that is causing it. This protest seems to be an own goal scored by very confused dinosaurs of the 1960s generation: do they want cheap energy or green energy? All that Centrica has to do to ridicule this is to point out that Greenpeace campaigned for the distorted market and increased cost of fuel in the first place.

By Roy Everett - 30 April 2012 at 2:45pm

These comments are so blatently from Centrica its a joke! Your trying to make it look like the general public is against this article by flooding the comments section with your own nonsense. Isn't that the same kind of tactics that dictators use to convince people they are still popular in their countries? North Korea anyone? Rediculous company whose employees are total tools!

(These are the comments of an ordinary person not affiliated with either side (I don't even contribute financially to Greenpeace))

By Steveo5252 - 30 April 2012 at 3:40pm

It's been a useful day has it? Centrica rolled over and meeting your unclear demands? Or have you just been mildly irritating?

maybe it's all too North Korea!!!!

pillock

By Anonymouse - 30 April 2012 at 4:01pm

This is soooo F ing funny, people making comments about energy prices in support of Green peace actions, i wonder what cars these people drive, how big are their homes, how many children they have, what's their favourite food, where do they like to go on holiday, what time is the number 43 bus from reading to basingstoke.....oh sorry that's right....who gives a crap!

The prices are dictated by the economical governing barons i.e. all these massive company's who drill it out of the ground. We want it, we need it, they supply it, cost is only the middle factor and we can do nothing about it. Reason being is, if you refuse to use it you'll go cold and either i'll or die, they have us over a barrell. So why bother.

There are far more other things in life to worry about than pointless demonstrations that will get you no-where. Hence look at the Petrol prices, that got us far last time we demonstrated didn't it!?

Go home spend time with your family, boyfriends, girlfriends, dogs (if your that way inclined) etc... "oh guess what i did today?, i demonstrated about the whole economical price of fuel at one of the many suppliers of it,". "and guess what happened?" "nothing, we went, we saw, we shouted, and then we left!" end of...... Wow what a difference, what a life......Get One, you wont change a thing, 'sad fact', but oh' so True!

You should be more worried about when the next meteorite is going to wipe us out, because there is more chance of that happening than these company's lowering their prices and the Govt' helping by reducing the fuel on the VAT with no however amount of support.

Go home or go to work and make a real difference!!!

By gas guzzler - 30 April 2012 at 4:08pm

I want to live on Roy Everett's planet - the one which has different laws of physics and chemistry such that CO2 isn't a pollutant and climate change isn't real... Sadly, Roy's planet is imaginary.

By Dave Hubble - 30 April 2012 at 4:09pm

1 person agrees

Shocking to hear that Centrica are bottom of the 'Big 6' for renewables, and then they come on here trying to greenwash themselves! Thanks for drawing this to our attention. It's actions like these that make me proud to be a Greenpeace supporter. I've sent my letter to Sam Laidlaw, and shared on Facebook and Twitter. What else can I do?

By Neil Jones - 30 April 2012 at 4:18pm

Tinkerbelle - " I thought people acted out of pure belief in their cause."

I assure you that most Greenpeace activists are volunteers, but in order for activism on this scale to be efficient, some people need to do it full time. As most of them still need to make a living somehow (so they can eat, pay the (gas) bills etc), it makes sense that some are paid a salary. Do you think that aid workers shouldn't get a salary? What about politicians? After all, they should be acting out of belief in their ideals.

Good work Greenpeace!!

By rbrandt - 30 April 2012 at 4:45pm

Hilarious puting that people you think are Centrica are like dictators if they put their point of view on the board. Your guys have been allowed to stay stopping people from getting to work with the UK laws allowing freedom of speach and protest. You then make facist comments when other people disagree with your one sided opinions. I know little about Centrica but if it is true their renewables team are based in Windsor and they have the lowest carbon footprint of the big 6, then I think GP should admit how wrong they are.

By JamieL26 - 30 April 2012 at 4:57pm

@JamieL26

Are you sure? This is no place for reason, logic and fairness!

By Anonymouse - 30 April 2012 at 5:13pm

Breaking news....greenpeace launch a hot air power generator...it's renewable too.

By Audrey Bob - 30 April 2012 at 5:39pm

This is a campaign worthy of the taxpayers alliance.

It's populist and misplaced.

As an environmentalist, I want higher energy bills.

By james f - 30 April 2012 at 6:10pm

I work in the electricity industry, but do so for a company outside of the big six developing power stations internationally. I joined the electricity industry specifically because of a desire to learn about the mechanisms to tackle climate change and to be involved in renewable energy development. I am also a long term financial supporter of Friends of the Earth.

I find this action, and Friends of the Earth's recent Final Demand campaign, to be staggeringly off the mark. Whether companies make big profits or charge high bills is IRRELEVANT to the issue of Climate Change, and I find this focus from Environmental groups to be both cynical (jumping on a public bandwagon) and detrimental to the message that they should be trying to promote. There are plenty of consumer rights organisations and regulators who know a lot more about economics, and I have frankly found some of the economic analysis I've read from environmental groups laughable.

The only possible angle of merit is the argument that in the long term renewables will lead to lower prices. If technologies develop sufficiently, I pray that this will be the case, and in the next 30 years I think Solar could finally get us out of the mess we are in. However, this is in the long term. At the moment, it's simply dishonest to lead people to believe that renewables don't need subsidies. They do. Plain and simple. Switching to Renewables in a big way now will cost money and push bills up.

Ultimately the public need to be convinced to accept higher prices for renewables in the short term. It seems to me that our Environmental lobby groups are singularly failing in gathering this support, and are instead relying on a false utopia backed by misinformation.

By Thomas 2012 - 30 April 2012 at 6:11pm

I think the facts speak for themselves. More investment in renewables. Especially more investment in proper insulation of properties. Heating uses a huge portion of the nation's energy consumption. Reduce that use - because it is not needed by proper insulation - by 20% will go a long way.

Prices of fossil fuels will rocket anyway. I expect oil prices to cross the $200.00 mark within a year.

.I think any energy firm not investing in R&D for renewables are suicidal since the finite sources of fuels is rapidly dwindling in the face of limited reserves, growing world population and the massive uptake by the giant nations who want to experience the pampered lifestyle of the West. The fact that these two nations are snapping up mineral and oilfield blocks out of the hands of Anglo-American, Rio Tinto, Shell, BP etc right across Africa means they will soon be the middle man selling such commodities to the West at whatever price they choose.,

It is a fact that the decline of the West as economic giants has been on the way for twenty years, only slowed by exploiting massive credit card frenzies and overspending by governments using heay borrowing. This decline will accelerate in the next ten years or so to the extent that we will join the 'poor nations' category. We must invest in ways to circumvent the energy crisis that is looming, via renewables that are far better and efficient than the technologies we have now. This too will give us a technological lead as well as generate a new tier in the energy market.

Nuclear? That is a short term fix with a massive long bterm clean-up cost. I see some of the major players for the new nuclear in Britain have now stepped down leaving only EDF.

By Collingwood - 30 April 2012 at 7:18pm

No Audrey Bob, your little knowledge is very dangerous. CE pricing to BG is crawled all over by the tax man and has to be at arms length price. No support or subsidy in either direction. This can mean CE profits are high but is not a situation of Centrica's making....

By Anonymous911 - 30 April 2012 at 7:37pm

This s hilarious, blatant, self defeating propoganda, it appears there is no true statement fron 'greenpeace' whom I respect, bu a badly executed publicity stunt, and a lot of childish bickering

By Johnny average - 30 April 2012 at 10:59pm

"What an incredible patchwork of opinions, what a great debate......why aren't people passionate all of the time, for or against, we need this debate and if it takes Greenpeace invading Centrica to get people thinking about our climate and energy future then all the better".

Sadly I don't think people are passionate about this debate but responding, in a knee jerk fashion, to their Centrica employer being challenged.

This is the reality,

"Fossil fuels are not sustainable - science. Therefore we need a viable alternative - fact".

By Amber45 - 30 April 2012 at 11:45pm

As a shareholder in Centrica, I find myself in total support of Greenpeace action, since apart from being a shareholder I am a consumer and an inhabitant of the planet. The bills of Centrica are too high, the methods f production unsustainable, and I do not want short term profits at the cost of my grandchildren's world.

Well done Greenpeace, please continue with the work of being the conscience of the planet a task that our government claims but fails by every measure.

By Le Dal - 1 May 2012 at 6:31am

Intrigued by this "debate" so looked into it a bit, no one is mentioning the lobbying Sam Laidlaw and Centrica has undertaken to PREVENT energy efficiency measures that could help people out of fuel poverty. A cynical person might suggest this is because it would mean selling less gas and making less profit.

By Paul Davis - 1 May 2012 at 10:24am

It's obvious that all of the Greenpeace activists at Centrica yesterday worked incredibly hard for a long time to pull this off and I for one am delighted that they were successful in closing down the office for an entire day.

I hope it sends a message to Centrica to stop lobbying for polluting gas and actually invest in renewables as much as they say they are.

It's completely understandable that Centrica employees' initial reaction is going to be denial. Quite rightly, they should be proud to be a part of a company that claims to be very environmentally friendly. Evidence to the contrary is going to take more than ten minutes of angry driving because of a wasted journey to work to sink in.

Well done, Greenpeace. Keep up the good work!

By annacharlotte - 1 May 2012 at 10:41am

1 person agrees

I hope it sends a message to Centrica to stop lobbying for polluting gas and actually invest in renewables as much as they say they are.

Well done, Greenpeace. Keep up the good work!

By annacharlotte - 1 May 2012 at 2:10pm

Thank you to everyone who has posted comments, it's great to see discussion around this issue. We have sent a response to Centrica which you can read here http://www.greenpeace.org.uk/blog/climate/centrica-are-still-20120502

By petespeller - 2 May 2012 at 6:08pm

Couldn't agree more with the previous comments. Greenpeace has just lost so much credibility with this ridiculous stunt. The UK needs companies with big balance sheets, like Centrica, to build wind farms on a scale that is efficient and it has to turn a profit in doing so otherwise it erodes investor confidence in green energy. Who do you think is going to pay for wind farms otherwise? Government?

By SophC - 3 May 2012 at 3:10am

Hello

I am not a Centrica employee. I am an independent writer, based in east London with no connection to any energy company, but an urgent interest in energy policy.

I recieved a communication from Greepeace today making the remarkable claim that investing in renewable energy at the current time would lower energy bills. Anyone with a passing familiarity with the energy issue will know that gas is the cheapest currenlty mass-deployable energy source available and the idea that replacing gas with renewables will reduce energy bills is absurd.

It is extraordinary that Greenpeace would make such a claim. I'm all in favour of setting up a renewable infrastructure, however, to claim the UK's energy infrastructure could be completely replaced with renewables at the current time is fantastical (unless Greepeace has access to information I've never seen); and the idea that replacing gas with renewables will decrease energy bills is not true.

Best regards

Peter Baker

www.thejollypilgrim.org

By Peter Baker - 4 May 2012 at 11:42pm

Peter - Firstly, thanks for engaging in the debate, we're really pleased that this subject has got people talking about energy.

To address your specific concerns, the reason for the recent bill hikes is the over reliance by energy companies such as Centrica on expensive, imported gas. Ofgem analysis has shown that of the average dual-fuel bill increase of £150 between March 2011 and March 2012, £100 is due to the volatile price of gas.

Energy bills are going to go up, whatever happens, however gas is set to become even more expensive, Sam Laidlaw stated as much in The Guardian, whilst the cost of renewable energy is set to come down. Combined with increased energy efficiency measures to reduce overall demand for energy, renewables can stablise bills and provide a clean, affordable energy future. A future tied to gas would see all the risk of volatile and rising gas prices pushing up bills passed to bill payers and would simply delay the costs of necessary investment in alternative energy sources.

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