Richard Heinberg explains.

The key difference between these homes and ours is that they were designed to face the sun, keep in the heat and keep out the cold. These homes are called passive houses.

Over a typical mortgage term this could mean 25 years of annual savings of £1200. That’s £30,000 saved at todays prices.

With an office building or school, the savings will be even higher.

Why are these standards now important?

Because the UK only has 10 years of it’s own gas supply left (see reference 1) after which 90% of our gas will come from norway and russia leaving 3 problems facing ALL UK consumers of gas.

one. The chances of having an uninterupted gas supply could fall.

two. The quality of gas will not be the same because it has to be mixed before it is pumped to our homes so it increases cost.

three. The price of gas is likely to be effected over this 10 year period.

How might this effect Bolton?

If you want to find out more about for yourself  please refer to the source information below.

References.
1.

Energy Facts – GAS

The Latest 5^th March 2009

The low level of storage in the UK was raised in parliament on 5^th March 2009. Shadow energy and climate change secretary Greg Clark said:

Hansard: 5th March Parliamentary Debate Gas Storage

For the second time in only four winters, we almost ran out of gas, and almost did not have sufficient gas to meet demand. According to a written answer that the Minister gave me only this morning, only the depressed state of the economy, due to the recession, saved us from running out. Even the official regulator thinks that we do not have enough storage. In the Energy and Climate Change Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Bromsgrove (Miss Kirkbride) asked the regulator whether he thought that enough storage was being planned, and he said:“I am not happy to talk about this…we were hoping that storage would have doubled in the past five years— “and we have barely moved.”

Source: accessed May 4^th 2009
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200809/cmhansrd/cm090305/debtext/90305-0002.htm#09030539000023

Nearly 6 years ago

A report from 2004.

SOURCE May 4^th 2009

http://www.parliament.uk/documents/upload/POSTpn230.pdf

Nearly 7 Years ago -
IMPORTING GAS INTO THE UK – GAS QUALITY ISSUES

(When gas is imported it does not meet UK quality standards we’ve enjoyed for so long and according to this report it would not burn as well, or could give of toxins and so mixing the gas before it’s pumped to Bolton might be an option. If the quality is still not good enough all of the burners in our gas combi boilers and gas cookers might need changing or complete renewal depending – however this may be complicated by the wide variety of gas imports that we’ll have in the next 10 years.)

In 2003 a study of  imported gas quality was undertaken.

Our conclusions

The UK is facing a completely new set of challenges in meeting its gas demand into the future as its reliance on gas imports grows.

Security of supply is becoming a matter of ensuring that sufficient gas can reasonably be procured and brought in to the country.

It will become increasingly difficult to stay within the current UK gas quality specification.  Gas purchasers do not have the ability to overcome all the obstacles that arise in guaranteeing to meet the UK specification and the mismatch in gas quality specification is already making it difficult to put gas sales agreements in place.

This could place the UK at a disadvantage in sourcing gas from a wide range of sources.  This in turn could put the UK at a disadvantage in an increasingly competitive global gas marketplace, potentially leading to higher prices, and it could also reduce security of supply.

The conclusion of phase one is that a problem related to future gas quality does exist and further work should be undertaken to address how to solve the problem in the most cost effective way.

Britain’s gas import dependency is forecast to grow to the order of 50% by 2010 and according to the Government’s white paper, could reach 90% by 2020.

The North European Gas Pipeline, if built, would provide a more direct route for transporting gas from Russia to Great Britain than the current routes, via a number of transit countries where gas is supplied from a number of sources.

Source: May 4^th 2009

http://www.hse.gov.uk/gas/domestic/importinggasissues.pdf

How do we get GAS?

GAS is piped into the UK from the north sea, Norway, Russia and we import liquid LPG gas from other countries. The gas has to be mixed and pumped to Bolton down these pipes.

Please have a read of PAGE 17 onwards.

SOURCE – 4 may 2009

http://www.oilandgas.org.uk/issues/gas/ilexreport.pdf

1956 The first alert that america was running out of oil is given by Hubert (a geoligist) who predicted that america’s peak production would occur between 1965-1970. No one believed him.
1972 America’s oil production peaked.
1973 Oil shortages send the world in recession
1974 A professional body is set up and tasked to monitor global oil supply and report on global supply to all governments so that they can plan their economies. (IEA.org)
2004 Shell announce that they don’t have the oil they said they had. Share price drops £4billion.
2005 People begin to question the stated oil reserves of the largest producers (Matt Simmonds investment banker)
2006 Oil price volatility is expected. (Matt Simmonds) infact Between 2005 and 2008 conventional oil production ceased to grow, despite massive investment, increasing demand and prices. This failure to increase conventional oil production, despite all the right incentives, is unprecedented in the history of the oil industry.
2007 By 2007, out of the world’s 20 largest producing oil fields, 17 were over 40 years old. The volume of oil production from 16 of this group of 20 largest fields was below their historical maximum.(ref 1).

In June several MP’s and Lords formed the All Party Parliamentary Group on Peak Oil to look into peak oil. http://appgopo.org.uk

By July the IEA world energy outlook that global governments rely on said..

“Despite four years of high oil prices, this report sees increasing market tightness beyond 2010, with OPEC spare capacity declining to minimal levels by 2012,”

2008 By Nov IEA release new energy findings after an audit on 800 global oil wells they conclude there will be an annual reduction of 6.7% or 67% over 10 years. Credit crisis errupts. Oil hits $147 a barrel.
2009 Oct. UK’s Energy Research Centre released a 300 page (plus seven detailed technical annexes) study entitled “Global Oil Depletion – An assessment of the evidence for near-term peak in global oil production.” (The report is available for downloading at the UKERC’s website.)

This is clearly the most sophisticated report of any that has been done so far, carefully weighing the evidence for and against an early peak of conventional oil production in 600 pages of detailed annexes.

2009

Now we here from the IEA that they are warning governments of an immenent supply shortage and a 50% drop in supply in only 11 years. Others including the US Military are quoting 2014 as a date of sever shortages.

http://www.globalwitness.org/media_library_detail.php/854/en/heads_in_the_sand_governments_ignore_the_oil_supply

Ref 1. – IBID. Taken from Page 6 of the global witness report above.

Tuesday 10 November 2009 14.30 GMT

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cif-green/2009/nov/10/peak-oil-fear-economic-establishment

Who are the International Energy Agency?
Set up after the 1970’s oil shocks to give world governments accurate estimates of the quantity of global oil so that they could plan their economic and transport policies.

Suddenly announce they have been offering governments advice based on ‘assumptions’ and after an urgent oil audit of about 800 global oil feilds they warn that the total world production of world oil will decline 6.7% annually from about 2020.

But experts from business like Richard Branson, oil geologists and now the US military point to a date closer to 2014.

6.7% x 10 years is 67% LESS OIL IN 2020. Do you really fancy being a government leader and talking about economic growth?

Amazing revelations are here on video.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/video/2008/dec/15/fatih-birol-george-monbiot

The peoples bank.