Ed Miliband conceded yesterday that the UK needed more gas storage, after the National Grid warned for the second time this week that supplies could run out. The first wave of gas cuts hit factories and industry across the country yesterday. Vauxhall’s car plant at Ellesmere Port and British Sugar’s refineries at Bury St Edmunds and Newark were among nearly 100 facilities that had their energy supplies cut.

The National Grid has also told British Gas and other power suppliers to cut or reduce their power to major corporate customers in an effort to preserve gas for domestic households as extreme weather caused a surge in demand.

The fuel switches in north-west England alone freed up enough extra gas to heat about 600,000 homes all day, a spokeswoman for the network operator said.

Yesterday’s warning followed a sharp drop in supplies from Norway on Sunday, which forced the operator to issue its first gas balancing alert since Monday.

It has issued only three appeals for help to balance supply in four years.

The National Grid’s second alert came as gas demand hit 454 million cubic metres – higher than the all-time record of 449 million in January 2003.

A spokesman for the Grid last night said: “There are some customers in the north-west and east Midlands who have had their business gas supplies interrupted because they are on interruptible contracts and we are facing very high demand.”

The cuts have drawn heavy criticism from industry groups, which accused ministers of ignoring warnings over shortcomings in the gas supply system.

The Major Energy Users Council said power interruptions were the last thing that struggling businesses needed, while the EEF manufacturers group – formerly the Engineering Employers Federation – said ministers had repeatedly ignored warnings the system was close to breaking point.

Roger Salomone from the EEF added: “While it is easy to say ‘I told you so’, the fact is we have been warning of such interruptions for a long time and the need for urgent investment in our infrastructure to avoid them.”

Shadow energy secretary Greg Clark said the power chaos tarnished the image of Britain at a time when the UK was trying to drag itself out of an economic slump.

He added: “We are heading for a crisis of confidence in the energy sector and the (demand/supply] situation would be worse if we did not have a recession that is reducing demand.”

But the Energy Secretary hit back, claiming the Conservatives were “playing politics” and scaring people with “meaningless” statistics about Britain’s energy supplies.

Mr Miliband stressed that figures revealed by the Tories, that the UK had only eight days’ worth of gas storage left, ignored the role of imports.

Insisting that more supplies were on the way, he added: “Your figures ignore the role of the North Sea, which provides 50 per cent of our gas storage and they ignore the role of import capacity in the UK.”

Mr Clark replied: “Fuel poverty is soaring, it is clear that every day that goes by the government are taking us back to a world we thought we had left behind in the 1970s.”

The UK is more exposed to gas supply problems than other countries because of its lower levels of storage capacity – accounting for about 5 per cent of the country’s needs, compared with about 24 per cent in France and 21 per cent in Germany.

Mr Miliband said: “We need more gas storage and there are more projects being planned we do need more gas storage.

“But it is worth saying that at the beginning of this week, UK gas storage was 80 per cent full.”

Related posts...

• July 19, 2011 -- EMR to Benefit Business Gas: (0)
  A week after the Electricity Market Reform (EMR) White Paper was published by the energy secretary Chris Huhne, industry experts and analysts have come forward to express their opinions and predict th...
• June 11, 2010 -- Switch Commercial Gas Suppliers: (3)
  You may be aware of some of the popular commercial gas suppliers such as British Gas, Npower Gas, Corona Gas, Gazprom and Total Gas. However, what you may not possess is the ability or the manpower ...
• June 8, 2010 -- Cheapest Business Gas Prices: (8)
  Every business has to deal with expenses related to energy and business gas consumption. Just like everything else, you can cut down expenses considerably if you're able to select the right supplier....
• June 2, 2010 -- Commercial Gas Prices: (8)
  A recent survey conducted by an independent energy consultancy company revealed that two-thirds of commercial gas and electricity customers have little or no idea of how much they are paying per unit ...
• April 22, 2010 -- Commercial Gas Price: (5)
  Current commercial gas prices are volatile at the moment, and with seasonal temperatures colder than normal for this time of year, this has helped support higher prices recently. But short term forec...
• January 11, 2012 -- Reducing Business Gas Usage: (0)
  Even though the fiscal only starts in April with the start of the new year many companies begin to revise their expenditures which includes their business gas and business electricity requirements. In...

1. [...] Here is the original post:  UK Energy News Blog, Business Energy and the UK Energy Market … Share : [...]

   Pingback by UK Energy News Blog, Business Energy and the UK Energy Market … | Today Headlines — January 10, 2010 @ 5:05 pm

2. [...] UK Energy News Blog, Business Energy and the UK Energy Market … [...]

   Pingback by Global sukuk rally in fourth quarter | Opalesque Islamic Finance … | Markets Finance Wisdom — January 11, 2010 @ 1:46 am

RSS feed for comments on this post.

Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.