Moving onto renewables

I contributed to a BBC Radio Wales interview on 6 November on the closure of the Murco oil refinery in Pembrokeshire. The research sources that I used are listed below:

The IPCC’s synthesis report suggests renewables will have to grow from their current 30% share to 80% of the power sector by 2050.

Matt McGrath, BBC, 2 November 2014

Growth of Tesla electric cars, and River Simple hydrogen electric at Llandrindod Wells are indicative of emerging markets in non-petrol based cars. River Simple also break the commercial model, with leasing, rather than ownership, being key to development.

www.riversimple.com

More than 800 global investors – including foundations such as the Rockefeller Brothers, religious groups, healthcare organisations, cities and universities – have pledged to withdraw a total of $50bn from fossil fuel investments over the next five years.

Guardian, 22 September 2014

According to reports, [Mark] Carney [Governor of the Bank of England] told a World Bank seminar on integrated reporting on Friday that the “vast majority of reserves are unburnable” if global temperature rises are to be limited to below 2C. Carney issued a stark warning over the lack of long-term thinking by governments and businesses, warning that a so-called “tragedy of horizons” could lead to market failure.

Guardian, 13 October

Scotland’s wind power sector delivered 126% of domestic energy demand in October. In Edinburgh, homes with solar heating and / or PV also produced over 40% of their own energy needs for hot water / electricity

Business Green, 4 November 2014

The price of a solar panel has dropped by more than 90% over the last 25 years, and continues to plummet. In the few places they have actually been deployed at scale, the results are astonishing: there were days this summer when Germany generated 75% of its power from the wind and the sun. 

Bill McKibben, Guardian, 2 November

The new overview (PDF in German) explains that there were 371,400 people employed in the renewables sector in 2013, and we know that this figure is down from 377,800 in 2012 and 381,600 in 2013.

Renewables International, 2014 

Wind, wave and tidal energy directly employ 18,465 people full time. The sector also supports 15,908 indirect jobs, making a total of over 34,300 employees. The number of employees in offshore wind has doubled since 2010. More than 70,000 jobs could be created over the next decade.

Renewables UK, November 2014

This means that there are 10x more jobs in renewables in Germany than UK,