“London Array shows you can build large-scale renewable energy projects right here in Britain,” Cameron said at the opening. “This is because when it comes to clean energy, the U.K. has one of the clearest investment climates globally.”
I guess David Cameron is right so far, that wind energy companies are more than happy to fill the country and its coastal waters with their unefficient, bird killing monsters as long as the government (taxpayers) minimizes the risk by paying huge subsidies.
The sad reality about the London Array and similar projects is not quite the success story Cameron and the wind lobby pretends it to be:
The London Array, Britain’s biggest wind farm, with 175 turbines, employs 90 people at its base in Ramsgate, Kent. The array, which is 12 miles offshore, became fully operational in the spring. The foundation predicts its Renewables Obligation subsidy in its first year of full operation will be £160million — effectively £1.77million per job.--
A new analysis of government and industry figures shows that wind turbine owners received £1.2billion in the form of a consumer subsidy, paid by a supplement on electricity bills last year.They employed 12,000 people, to produce an effective £100,000 subsidy on each job.--
Campaigners also warn that turbines do not generate power when the wind is too low or too high, and cannot store it, meaning conventional generation is needed as a backup.
Dr John Constable, director of Renewable Energy Foundation, said: “Subsidies can create some soft jobs in the wind power industry but will destroy real jobs and reduce wages in other sectors, in the UK’s case because the subsidies cause higher electricity prices for industrial and commercial consumers. The extravagant subsidy cost per wind power job is an indication of the scale of that problem.”
He added: “Truly productive energy industries — gas, coal, oil, for example — create jobs indirectly by providing cheap energy that allows other businesses to prosper, but the subsidy-dependent renewables sector is a long way from this goal; it’s still much too expensive.”
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