Households' £730 bill for green energy

Households will have to pay up to £730 a year to fund plans to tackle climate change, it was claimed yesterday.
Under laws proposed by Brussels, Britain will be forced to generate 40% of its electricity from green sources within 12 years. Currently, the figure for wind, wave and hydroelectric power is just 2%.
To meet the target - and avoid hefty fines - energy experts say thousands more wind turbines will be needed. The move would anger anti-turbine campaigners and represent an enormous engineering challenge.

Brussels says the proposals are essential to curb global warming even though environmentalists say they do not go far enough. The European Commission claimed the package would cost the average European citizen £115 a year. Britons will pay far more because the country lags in the green energy stakes.

Open Europe, a Eurosceptic think-tank supported by Marks & Spencer boss Sir Stuart Rose, said a typical family would be paying a £730 levy by 2020.

In order to produce enough green energy by that date, Britain would need to build two giant wind turbines every day. 'Britain has such a low level of renewable energy right now, the cost of meeting this target will be higher than for most other EU countries,' said Open Europe spokesman Hugo Robinson.

The climate change plans were unveiled by Jose Manuel Barroso, the Portuguese European Commission president. The commission pledged last year to generate 20% of Europe's energy from renewable sources - such as wave, tidal, hydroelectric and wood burning - within 12 years.

Europe is demanding that 15% of all the energy used in Britain for electricity, transport and heating comes from renewables - a rise of 13% on the current level. No other country faces such a large increase. Britain is already committed to ensuring that 10% of the energy used for transport is biofuel - produced from crops rather than oil - so further opportunities for green transport fuel are limited.
David Derbyshire, Daily Mail

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