Welsh Turn To Green Energy As Gas And Electricity Prices Increase
Welsh home owners are turning to green energy to heat their homes as wholesale gas and electricity prices increase.
There are an increasing number of Welsh households choosing to turn to sources of renewable energy as gas and electricity prices look set to rise by as much as 15% in the next few months.
New figures show that wholesale electricity prices have gone up 40% in the last 12 months and gas has risen by around 30% in only the last 8 weeks.
The average annual gas and electricity bill is set to be as much as £1,300 in 2011 and Andrew Boroughs, who runs Organic Energy says people are turning to alternative sources of energy such as biomass boilers and solar thermal systems to heat their homes.
During the first quarter, Mr Boroughs has seen the sale of wood pellet boilers increase by 20%.
He said “Over the course of the past year, every one of the six biggest energy providers in the UK raised its prices and the new increases are likely to be added to customers’ bills by the start of the summer”.
However, as Mr Boroughs added, many Welsh home owners use oil to heat their homes and Utility Exchange reported earlier this year on claims that suppliers were profiteering by pushing up oil prices during the cold weather. Not only that but some people had their heating oil stolen and police warned home owners to ensure they locked their oil tanks.
Mr Boroughs said “Anyone who ran out of heating oil last winter knows just how dependent rural properties in particular are on this fossil fuel, the cost of which is also increasing”.
Organic Energy, based in Welshpool, supplies wood pellet boilers and Mr Boroughs said the company’s sales were up by 20% compared with last year.
He added “It makes sense to use renewable energy, which is low cost and good for the environment, but also puts money back in the bank”.
It seems as though the Feed In Tariff scheme seems to be having an impact on the number of homes choosing sources of renewable energy. Recently on my travels I’ve seen a number of homes with solar panels on their roof. As gas and electricity becomes more expensive it may be more and more common to see homes with some form of renewable energy, whether it’s small wind turbines, solar panels or biomass boilers.
As domestic energy users move towards renewable energy it may become more common for business energy users to move towards renewable energy. We may therefore also see an increasing number of small business owners installing renewable energy to cut their business energy bills as business electricity prices and gas prices are set to rise too.