Half of Britain’s electricity in 2025 will have to come from gas-fired power stations even if all the policies in the government’s energy white paper are successful, according to calculations from Ernst & Young. Wind farms connected to the grid would provide only 7%of Britain’s electricity, and nuclear power stations 11%, a smaller proportion than today, in spite of government efforts to encourage investment in renewables and reactors. The forecasts also suggest that renewables could provide at best 16% of Britain’s power by 2025. That is far short of the proportion likely to be needed to hit the European Commission’s target, expected to be set tomorrow, for the UK to get 14-15% of all its energy from renewable sources by 2020. The use of gas is expected to grow over the next two decades, from about a third of generation capacity today, because gas-fired power stations are relatively cheap and quick to build. Ernst & Young estimates that a gas-fired plant costs about £500m per 1,000MW of capacity, compared with £1bn-£1.2bn for a coal-fired station and about £1.6bn for nuclear. Where a coal-fired plant can take three to four years to build, and a nuclear plant five or six, once construction starts a gas-fired plant can take little more than two years to bring on line. As old coal-fired and nuclear power stations have to be closed down, new gas stations will fill much of the gap. Most of the power stations now being built or in the planning process will be gas-fired.

The Commission’s target for the UK’s renewable energy is expected to be set out in its environment and energy plans for the European Union tomorrow. As electricity makes up less than 20 per cent of total energy use, but is the component most suitable for renewable sources, that target implies that 30-40% of Britain’s requirement would have to come from renewables, mostly wind.