analysis
Every year we import and consume a vast amount of oil, the majority of which is burnt in the engines of our cars. But right now EU member states are looking to take their positions on the “Cars and CO2” regulation. Could driving fuel efficiency also provide a way for struggling EU governments to cut their structural deficits?
Scenarios for an imagined future have become key to the debate over UK energy. For every set of policy positions there is a matching scenario – but how useful are they?
Documents recently released by the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) reveal that the government’s “central scenario” for UK power generation over coming decades could see legally-binding carbon targets breached because of significant carbon emissions resulting from an unexpectedly large role for old coal-fired power stations right through to 2030.
As the government finally gives the go-ahead to fracking in the UK we look across the Atlantic to see if the US shale revolution can be replicated here.
Richard George looks at the numbers for renewables deployment into the 2020s and asks whether the government's strategy stands up to scrutiny.
Debate: Carbon Counter's Robert Wilson suggests that, without nuclear, more gas capacity would be needed in future.
Britain should get fracking, says the Mayor of London in a surprisingly detailed intervention into the UK's energy policy. We give 10 of his claims the once over.
The government has just revised downards its forecast of the role that nuclear will be playing by the end of the next decade. So what has the government said over the years, and what effect would further slippage have on our lans to decarbonise the UK's power sector?
In his Autumn Statement yesterday, George Osborne announced that he would be consulting on tax breaks for the shale gas industry arguing that: "we don't want British families and businesses to be left behind as gas prices tumble on the other side of the Atlantic," but will shale actually lower prices? Lawrence Carter investigates:
