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Amazing the UK exporting energy to France when it is in the state it is. Similarly; during the potato famine Britain exported much of Irelands food crops. Now

by stuaxo 4y ago

Amazing the UK exporting energy to France when it is in the state it is. Similarly; during the potato famine Britain exported much of Irelands food crops. Now, the UK is doing this to it's own population, much of it's Oil and Gas from the North see is being exported. Ordinary people are getting hit with what will be some of the biggest prices rises in Europe, but the people who have been in charge for 12 years don't care. The new prime minister says she will fix this, but she was a minister for 8 years in this government, and her solution is to keep all the energy company profits, and give people a stopgap that will be added onto their bills for the next 10 years.

rjmunro 4y ago
Right now, the UK is exporting energy to France because we are receiving Liquified Natural Gas at our Gas terminals and have nowhere to store it and can't send it over pipelines to Europe fast enough, so our only option is to burn it for electricity and sell that. Once other EU LNG terminals come online, and as the UK needs more energy itself over winter, it stop exporting. Hopefully some more UK gas storage will come on line in the next few weeks as well, but probably not enough to make a significant difference to this winter's outlook: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-08-31/centrica-moves-closer-to-restoring-key-uk-gas-reserve-for-winter https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-08-31/centrica-...
adolph 4y ago
> UK exporting energy to France > solution is to keep all the energy company profits Interesting way of taxing people outside of one's jurisdiction to subsidize local people.
- pjc50 4y ago
  Where are EDF's (Electricite de France) profits for their UK generating units accounted for? Not a rhetorical question, I genuinely have no idea and I know it's quite easy to shift profits across borders.
matt_attack 4y ago
Sounds like what's happening in the US with our natural gas.
- hollerith 4y ago
  Except natgas prices in the UK are 10 times the US price.
jl6 4y ago
> keep all the energy company profits With the new energy profits levy introduced in July, the headline tax rate for oil & gas profits is now 65%, which is some way off letting the energy companies keep their profits. What the UK is doing is letting its energy companies make bank while prices are high, and taking a (temporarily enhanced) cut of that to fund a cost of living subsidy for consumers.
- pjc50 4y ago
  This article is reporting EBITDA numbers: https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/energy-prices-rising-suppliers-record-profits_uk_62f41502e4b0ab35e0afbcb7 https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/energy-prices-rising-... What I would like to know is how that handles amortization? Especially for renewables where the capex is huge and the opex small. Is that a before or after amortization number? The prices quoted are absolutely crippling, though. I wonder if people would actually prefer a 1970s style rolling blackouts to having two thirds of small businesses go bankrupt.
- pbhjpbhj 4y ago
  Example, report in the papers 2 days ago local restaurant struggling to justify staying open as their energy bill (gas+electric) went up 7x (£60k last year, predicted £420k this year). So, that 65% tax on profits really isn't doing much, it's passed on to customers. Tax rises only make sense here with capped prices.
GekkePrutser 4y ago
Usually that is due to existing contract agreements and futures. Which was agreed on by all parties involved. In the Netherlands we're also getting questions about why we're exporting so much gas we need ourselves. Well that's why. We've already sold it, it just hasn't been delivered yet.
LatteLazy 4y ago
As you can see in [1] we import about 7 times more gas than we export. So closing exports (and thus also imports) would be pretty catastrophic for us. I don't disagree that those in charge don't care, but that doesn't mean this problem is caused by exports... 1 https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/nationalaccounts/balanceofpayments/articles/trendsinukimportsandexportsoffuels/2022-06-29#:~:text=Norway%20is%20typically%20the%20UK's,the%20United%20States%20and%20Russia https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/nationalaccounts/balanceofpay....

by stuaxo 4y ago

rjmunro 4y ago

Right now, the UK is exporting energy to France because we are receiving Liquified Natural Gas at our Gas terminals and have nowhere to store it and can't send it over pipelines to Europe fast enough, so our only option is to burn it for electricity and sell that. Once other EU LNG terminals come online, and as the UK needs more energy itself over winter, it stop exporting. Hopefully some more UK gas storage will come on line in the next few weeks as well, but probably not enough to make a significant difference to this winter's outlook: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-08-31/centrica-moves-closer-to-restoring-key-uk-gas-reserve-for-winter https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-08-31/centrica-...

adolph 4y ago

> UK exporting energy to France > solution is to keep all the energy company profits Interesting way of taxing people outside of one's jurisdiction to subsidize local people.

pjc50 4y ago
Where are EDF's (Electricite de France) profits for their UK generating units accounted for? Not a rhetorical question, I genuinely have no idea and I know it's quite easy to shift profits across borders.

matt_attack 4y ago

Sounds like what's happening in the US with our natural gas.

hollerith 4y ago
Except natgas prices in the UK are 10 times the US price.

jl6 4y ago

> keep all the energy company profits With the new energy profits levy introduced in July, the headline tax rate for oil & gas profits is now 65%, which is some way off letting the energy companies keep their profits. What the UK is doing is letting its energy companies make bank while prices are high, and taking a (temporarily enhanced) cut of that to fund a cost of living subsidy for consumers.

pjc50 4y ago
This article is reporting EBITDA numbers: https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/energy-prices-rising-suppliers-record-profits_uk_62f41502e4b0ab35e0afbcb7 https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/energy-prices-rising-... What I would like to know is how that handles amortization? Especially for renewables where the capex is huge and the opex small. Is that a before or after amortization number? The prices quoted are absolutely crippling, though. I wonder if people would actually prefer a 1970s style rolling blackouts to having two thirds of small businesses go bankrupt.
pbhjpbhj 4y ago
Example, report in the papers 2 days ago local restaurant struggling to justify staying open as their energy bill (gas+electric) went up 7x (£60k last year, predicted £420k this year). So, that 65% tax on profits really isn't doing much, it's passed on to customers. Tax rises only make sense here with capped prices.

GekkePrutser 4y ago

Usually that is due to existing contract agreements and futures. Which was agreed on by all parties involved. In the Netherlands we're also getting questions about why we're exporting so much gas we need ourselves. Well that's why. We've already sold it, it just hasn't been delivered yet.

LatteLazy 4y ago

As you can see in [1] we import about 7 times more gas than we export. So closing exports (and thus also imports) would be pretty catastrophic for us. I don't disagree that those in charge don't care, but that doesn't mean this problem is caused by exports... 1 https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/nationalaccounts/balanceofpayments/articles/trendsinukimportsandexportsoffuels/2022-06-29#:~:text=Norway%20is%20typically%20the%20UK's,the%20United%20States%20and%20Russia https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/nationalaccounts/balanceofpay....