Great British Energy will be a publicly-owned energy company, designed to drive clean energy deployment, boost energy independence, create jobs and ensure UK taxpayers, billpayers and communities reap the benefits of clean, secure, home-grown energy.
Well that’s what it says on the back of the tin, so to speak.
However, Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero Ed Milliband has admitted that it could take five years for Labour’s new taxpayer-owned energy company to start turning a profit.
I can believe that!
As for confusion over whether the company will produce its own energy or simply invest in renewable projects such as wind and solar, the answer is surely with difficulty; not with a war-chest of just £8.3billion of public money over five years.
It absolutely depends upon the private sector and mostly state-owned generators from other countries to stump up the real money.
I fear that any GB Energy stakes in developments will be miniscule bordering on pointless.
In any case, the UK State should simply take 5%, 10% or whatever of every project completed, end of.
In a sense, the £8.3 billion is bait with which to draw in a shoal of big energy fish to plough £60 billion into UK renewables by 2030-ish.
And so, here we go again, near total dependence on a market-led foreign dosh solution. Typical Tory style.
Look no further than the shambles that is today’s UK rail industry privatised in 1993 under John Major.
At least Network Rail, controller of the track on which the many disastrous franchisees – largely offshoots of foreign state railways – is nominally state-controlled.
Might this become the reality of GB Energy? If so, that will worry me as Network Rail is singularly ineffectual.
Will the fact that GB Energy intends to work hand-in-glove with the Crown Estate save it from such a fate?
After all, the Crown Estate has had plenty of offshore wind farm leasing round practice.
Well, yes and no. Last year’s offshore wind round was disastrous. Nothing was signed up despite there being the potential for five gigawatts of projects.
Indeed, industry sources branded the round’s failure a “catastrophic outcome” for UK offshore wind.
None of the UK’s biggest offshore wind developers took part in the auction after many complained to government ministers and officials that the maximum price had been set far too low.
It was drastically jacked up in November after industry protests. The maximum strike price was raised 66% for offshore wind projects, from £44/ MWh to £73/ MWh , and by 52% for floating offshore wind.
Given that its role includes identifying and leasing suitable seabed sites for development, awarding rights for extensions to existing projects, facilitating test and demonstration opportunities, as well as working with partners to build evidence, share data and support innovation to enable responsible and coordinated growth of offshore wind, the Crown Estate appeared to emerge blameless.
This begs the question, how secretive are the back-office relationships between the Crown Estate and relevant government departments?
Because, pound to a penny, there will be such relationships though they would of course be vehemently denied. Just saying!
The ‘Pink ‘un’ said of the tie-up with the Crown Estate: “GB Energy, due to be set up in coming months under new legislation, will help with early development work on Crown Estate projects to help get them off the ground, including by potentially taking a small stake to reduce private investors’ risk.”
The Starmer Administration said: “This [work] will ensure that future offshore wind development has lower risk for developers, enabling projects to build out faster after leasing and crowding in private sector investment.
“It will also help boost new technologies such as carbon capture and storage, hydrogen, wave and tidal energy,” it added.
Ye gods, GB Energy’s wee pot of money really isn’t going to spread far with all of that and more besides loaded into its work hopper.
£8.3billion scraped across five years like cheap margarine is an insult to the massive task ahead and it would come as no surprise if the UK’s 2030 low carbon energy targets are missed.
Don’t forget that, in February, Labour slashed its green investment plans by half.
In a move that prompted an angry response from environmental groups, unions and some in the energy sector, PM Starmer and Rachel Reeves, now chancellor, jointly announced they would slash the green prosperity plan from £28billion a year to less than £15billion a year – only a third of which would be new money.
At least GB Energy is to become a reality; that I welcome. But what happens if Labour gets chucked out in five years?
Well, if by a miracle the Tories got back in, the gods forbid, they would kill it; just like Mrs Thatcher executed The British National Oil Corporation in 1988.