Gas

George Monbiot was back on the energy case in a piece in yesterday's Guardian (see the same piece with footnotes at his own site). I still feel pretty uncertain about the "hydrogen economy", but Monbiot is coming at it from a more informed position than most.

This section of his piece is, I feel, the most important one to consider:

"The problem comes down to this: that our homes, whose consumption has grown by 19% since 1990, now account for almost one-third of the energy the United Kingdom uses(8). Of this, only 18% is used for lights and fridges and TVs and the other electronic gadgets with which we now fill them. All the rest is used for space and water heating(9). In the domestic sector, the big issue is not electricity but heat.

I’ve looked into every source of sustainable heat I can find, and while there are plenty that could supply some of our houses – wood and straw, solar hot water panels, district heating systems and heat pumps for example – all of them are constrained by one factor or another, such as a shortage of agricultural land, our feeble sun and the disruption involved in fitting them to existing homes. It seems that there is only one low-carbon source of heat which could (with a massive investment in new infrastructure) be supplied to most of the homes in the United Kingdom between now and 2030. It is hydrogen."

As I say, while I'm still not totally convinced by the Hyrdogen angle, I think that Monbiot is doing good service to the realpolitik of the energy situation by asking these questions about our future heating needs.

Monbiot's question marks about the UK's gas future should usefully be read alongside Rob Hopkin's in a recent post at Transition Culture.