Ed Davey’s energy fantasies

As energy prices continue to — with British Gas imposing a 9.2 per cent rise — the government is under growing pressure. The tragedy is that any genuine solution to the largely self-inflicted energy fiasco will not be considered let alone enacted any time soon – as we can tell by the recent outings of the climate change secretary Ed Davey.

The controversy about the proportion of green taxes on energy bills looks trivial compared to the tornado that is going to hit parties in coming years – as the government’s self-imposed decarbonisation targets drive energy prices up relentlessly. If the rise in wholesale gas prices is seen as a crisis, just consider the effect of an Energy Bill that will increase green energy subsidies by a factor of five — to a staggering amount of nearly £50 billion by 2020. This is precisely what’s now going through parliament.

Yet when it comes to the cost estimates, Ed Davey and other advocates of low-carbon energy promise consumers the earth: households would only be charged a pittance which would steadily decrease in years to come.