Dora Meade

Labour’s pursuit of net zero will cost households an average of £500 extra a year because it relies on the “vagaries of the British weather”, a report backed by the Tories has warned Onward, a right-leaning think tank, modelled the government’s net-zero policy against Conservative plans to end subsidies for wind and solar energy from the early 2030s and instead rely on a mix of nuclear, gas and renewables Its report says that the approach would save Britain £320 billion between 2030 and 2050 — equivalent to £540 a year per household — in the form of lower network costs, lower wholesale prices, the removal of carbon taxes and lower subsidies More than half of the savings would come from reducing the need to build so many pylons and cables to connect distant wind and solar farms to the grid Claire Coutinho, the shadow energy secretary, told The Times: “What we’ve all been told time after time is that all this wind and solar is going to be cheap. But actually when you have too much in the system it means that your electricity becomes very unpredictable “You have to pay all these extra costs when it’s too windy to switch farms off, you have to pay all these extra costs when it’s not windy enough for this expensive backup “You have to build all these extra pylons and grid to connect those wind farms up in Scotland down to where energy is needed “The point that the report is making is that you can actually have an electricity system which is still clean but is considerably cheaper. “For far too long we have been pursuing an ideological approach to energy as opposed to one that’s based on facts. As the report says, we used to have an energy system that depended on the weather 300 years ago but we were considerably poorer.” Miatta Fahnbulleh, the energy secretary, said: “By following Reform’s lead, the Tories will tie Britain to the fossil fuel rollercoaster and keep bills higher for families." thetimes.com/uk/politics/art…