Energy And Climate Change Committee News

Bloomberg reports that the U.K. could save as much as $5.6 billion by connecting offshore wind farms to each other, cutting down on construction and operating costs. As much as 15 percent of the cost could be knocked off the bill for building wind infrastructure, according to a report today from the Department of Energy and Climate Change and energy regulator Ofgem. The U.K. is seeking to have about 18 gigawatts of turbines at sea installed, up from 2 gigawatts at present,  to meet climate change goals. A European “supergrid,” linking Britain’s electricity network to the continent, could reduce the cost of connecting offshore wind farms by a quarter, according to the U.K. parliamentary Energy and Climate Change Committee.

According to a March 19 report from Dow Jones & Company, Inc., investment and exploration in the U.K. North Sea oil and gas basin could collapse this year because of high costs and a funding drought, said the head of the country's oil and gas industry lobby. Investment could have halved within two years and exploration and appraisal of new reserves in 2009 could fall to a third of the 2008 level, Oil and Gas U.K. Chief Executive Malcolm Webb told a special session of the U.K. parliament's Energy and Climate Change Committee in Aberdeen, Scotland. (Source Dow Jones & Company, Inc.)