Is net zero really to blame for soaring energy bills in Great Britain?
A wave of recent rightwing commentary has attempted to blame the gas crisis variously on Greta Thunberg, “the state”, “green regulations”, “net zero fanaticism” and “climate alarmism”.
David Frost, the Nigel Farage, Allison Pearson, Tim Newark, Iain Martin, Leo McKinstry and Steve Baker have all made similar claims, in outlets from the Daily Telegraph to the Daily Express and the Times, joined by editorials in the Wall Street Journal and the Daily Mail.
Their most common target is the “green levies” that the Conservative leadership frontrunner, Liz Truss, has promised to “suspend” if she becomes prime minister. From the frequency with which the levies are targeted, one might imagine they are playing at least some small part in rising bills.
In reality, the opposite is true. Since last summer, levies have fallen to about £150 a year. This is 8% of average bills – not 25% – as recent corrections in the Daily Mail and Daily Express admitted.
To imagine that falling green levies are the problem, when soaring gas prices will soon have added £2,200 to household bills, is truly to enter the upside down.
My latest Carbon Brief analysis shows an elevenfold increase in wholesale gas prices is behind 96% of the unprecedented surge in energy costs that are due to hit households this winter.
This brings us to the second argument from those who attempt to blame the energy crisis on climate policy, namely that gas is expensive because of the government’s legally binding target of net zero emissions by 2050.
Writing in the Daily Telegraph on 9 August, for example, Farage blamed “the self-inflicted wounds of net zero fanaticism underpinning the [energy] crisis”.
Farage, a self-confessed “admire[r]” of the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, does
Read more on theguardian.com
