British Gas boss Phil Bentley to quit

via express.co.uk

Speculation that Bentley had fallen out with Centrica chief executive Sam Laidlaw has been played down. But with Laidlaw likely to remain in post for the foreseeable future Bentley is having to look elsewhere if he wants a chief executive role.

Bentley, who was credited with improving British Gas' customer services and call centre operations, was paid £681,000 last year. He also has £6.7million in shares and has a £210,000-a-year pension.

Laidlaw is due next month to update investors on his strategy for the group, which also comprises an oil and gas exploration and production business and a North American operation. Centrica declined to comment.

http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/369184/British-Gas-boss-Phil-Bentley-to-quit

Npower fourth supplier to announce energy efficiency target win

via utilityweek.co.uk

Npower is the latest energy supplier to announce it has met all its targets under energy efficiency schemes Cert and Cesp, subject to verification by Ofgem. Of the big six, only Scottish Power and British Gas have yet to reveal whether they hit the targets by the 31 December deadline.

Npower added its voice to calls on government to cap the cost of replacement scheme the Energy Company Obligation (Eco). The Department of Energy and Climate Change expects Eco to cost the industry £1.3 billion, however Npower warned Cert and Cesp had shown costs could significantly exceed forecasts.

Simon Stacey, managing director of Npower energy services, said: "I am very concerned about the impact on customers' bills. To ensure that we do not have an open-ended commitment which could significantly increase bills, we are calling on DECC (Department of Energy and Climate Change) to cap the cost of Eco at £1.3bn.

http://www.utilityweek.co.uk/news/news_story.asp?id=197972&title=Npower+fourt...

Why IS Britain about to pay £110billion to enter a new Dark Age? A damning indictment of the new 'Green-friendly' Energy Bill

via dailymail.co.uk

The stupidest international agreement since the Treaty of Versailles expired at midnight on New Year’s Eve. Fifteen years after its launch, the Kyoto Protocol to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change died a miserable failure. Few are likely to mourn.

According to Kyoto’s authors, it should by now have triggered a five per cent fall in the world’s carbon dioxide emissions. In fact, they have risen by 58 per cent because the world’s faster-growing economies never ratified Kyoto at all, nor the drastic cuts in the use of fossil fuel it prescribed.
China, America, Brazil and India simply ignored it, while Canada, New Zealand and Russia, although initially committed, later cast it aside.

In Britain, however, the Government remains wedded to a post-Kyoto strategy, and along with the rest of the EU has agreed to ‘extend’ the treaty’s provisions. One consequence of this is the new Energy Bill, which by 2020 will triple the subsidies paid by taxpayers and consumers to ‘renewable’ energy suppliers to £7.6 billion a year.

The bungs paid to operate offshore wind turbines – the most expensive form of energy ever devised – will rise 16-fold to an annual £4.2 billion. The hated onshore turbines will also get huge new subsidies, at least doubling their number to about 6,500.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2257826/Why-IS-Britain-pay-110billion...

Investors spooked by 'complex' UK Energy Bill

via telegraph.co.uk

Ian Simm, chief executive of Impax Asset Management, which has almost £2bn of assets under management, said it would like to invest in UK wind farms - but the policy framework was currently too complex and unclear. "We are waiting to see what the landscape looks like," he said.

The Energy Bill, intended to drive £110bn investment in new low-carbon power to keep the lights on this decade, was introduced to Parliament this month [DEC] but is unlikely to gain Royal Assent until the end of next year.

Impax has a private equity investment arm specialising in funding the construction of renewable energy projects but currently does not invest in the UK.

"We would be very keen to jump into the UK once the Bill has been sorted out. But the situation is currently so complex that it is going to take several years to work out what the market looks like," Mr Simm told The Daily Telegraph.

"The detail is going to be in the secondary legislation and it's the detail that will determine whether lenders are willing to lend to projects."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/energy/9783708/Investors-spoo...

Anaerobic Digestion (AD) industry less than impressed by Renewables Roadmap

via renewableenergymagazine.com

Warren Buffett to build world's largest #solar energy project

via telegraph.co.uk

MidAmerican Energy Holdings, a subsidiary of Mr Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway investment company, has struck a deal with SunPower to acquire and build two projects in California’s Antelope Valley.

The deal, which will see MidAmerican pay between $2bn to $2.5bn, marks the third time in little over a year that Mr Buffett has ploughed cash into solar energy.

He last year created a unit within Mid American to support an increasing number of solar and wind investments.

Work on the projects will begin within the next few months and construction is expected to be completed by the end of 2015.

SunPower, which is 66pc-owned by France’s Total, will remain involved in the construction and operation of the projects.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/energy/9777016/Warren-Buffett...

Renewables roadmap boost for solar

via nfuonline.com