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A key report published under the auspices of the Royal Society understated the cost of building a Net Zero electricity grid by half a trillion pounds, according to Net Zero Watch, in a post published today on its website. According to Net Zero Watch director Andrew Montford, the error revolves around how the costs of building wind and solar farms and other equipment will change over the next 25 years. The Royal Society has used Whitehall estimates of the costs for 2040 but has applied them from the start of the build period. Mr Montford said: “It is simply absurd to use estimated costs for a windfarm in 2040 when calculating the costs of building one today.”
Mr Montford said “If we assume that costs fall, over 25 years, from the levels seen today to those assumed by the Royal Society, the cost of building the Net Zero grid is around £960 billion rather than the £410 billion claimed by the Royal Society.”
Mr Montford says that there is no doubt about what the Royal Society has done, since the basis of the figure they have calculated is clearly stated in the report. However, although the Royal Society author team has been aware of the problem for several months, they have made no correction. Mr Montford said: “If the error is corrected, the cost of decarbonising the grid looks unaffordable. £960 billion is £38 billion per year, at a time when we are cutting winter fuel allowance to save less than £2 billion per year. Setting these painful facts out clearly would certainly be politically inconvenient for the Government.”
NotesThe Royal Society report, entitled Large-scale Electricity Storage was published last year. https://royalsociety.org/news-resources/projects/low-carbon-energy-programme/large-scale-electricity-storage/ Net Zero Watch published a critique, entitled Costing the Green Grid. https://www.netzerowatch.com/all-papers/costing-the-green-grid
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