Supermarkets to stock plug-in solar panels – Daily Business

Ed Miliband: ‘new North Sea exploration licences would not take a penny off bills’

Shoppers will be able to buy plug-in solar panels at the supermarket under plans announced by Net Zero Secretary Ed Miliband.

He is in talks with supermarket chains to stock the panels in the grocery aisles to encourage householders to install them in their gardens and on balconies.

The initiative was included in an announcement on strengthening energy security in which Mr Miliband again rejected calls for further oil and gas exploration in the North Sea, but is bringing forward the next auction round for renewables.

His department says easy-to-install, plug-in solar could see households make significant savings on their energy bills.

Plug-in solar is already widely used in homes across Europe, with Germany seeing around half a million new devices plugged in last year alone. The Government will work with the relevant bodies, consumer groups and industry to introduce new standards and amend regulations to get these onto the market as soon as possible. 

Responding to calls to ease restrictions on the oil and gas industry, Mr Miliband said North Sea production continues to play an important and valuable role, “which is why we are keeping existing oil and gas fields open for their lifetime.

“But it is an inescapable fact that the North Sea is a maturing basin, with production down 75% since 1999.

“Because of this, Britain is a price taker not a price maker in international fossil fuel markets. New exploration licences would not take a penny off bills, as the Conservatives admitted when they were in office.”

More wind power will be fast-tracked

Writing in The Observer, Mr Miliband added: “New exploration licences are simply too marginal to have a meaningful impact on levels of oil and gas production.

“And as the National Energy System Operator (Neso) says, they would not make a material difference. Meanwhile, the faster we reduce our use of gas across the economy, the less reliant we will be on imports. Staying on track for net zero will save the equivalent of two liquefied natural gas terminals’ worth of gas demand by 2050.

“So the transition to clean energy is fundamental to energy security. But at precisely this moment of global instability, opponents have pledged to “wage war” on the very energy sources we need.

“The Conservatives said we should cancel the most recent renewables auction, and Reform has said it would rip up renewables contracts. We should be clear about what this would mean: a permanent outsourcing of our energy security to global markets we don’t control.”

Mr Miliband’s department intends to bring forward the government’s next annual renewables auction to July, inviting renewables companies to invest in UK energy.

The most recent round was the biggest ever and alongside the previous auction, Mr Miliband said the UK has enough clean energy to power the equivalent of 23 million homes.

The Competition and Markets Authority has set out plans to step up monitoring of the road fuel sector to rapidly identify any signs that fuel stations are exploiting the Gulf situation. It has also written to heating oil firms to obtain further evidence and assess whether their practices raise consumer protection concerns.   

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