It only takes one Frankenstorm to ruin your day. Since a Frankenstorm is just a regular big storm on steroids, and those proverbial steroids are the effect of the heat retained by the planet due to all the fossil fuel combustion producing CO2 pollution, proper accounting needs to add that onto the natural gas price. But there will be no such proper accounting, especially in Conservative or Rethuglican (US Conservatives) Hive Mindthink. CO2 pollution is a freebie, period, because by definition there is not such a thing as CO2 pollution.

The Stern Report attempted to do this, and it came up with a CO2 pollution cost of around $US 85/ton in present dollars (but then used tonnes, and 2007 currencies). That is Euro 59.56/tonne CO2 pollutant.

When burned, methane makes 122.5 lbs of CO2 pollutant per 1000 standard cubic feet. Translating this to Eurovalues, that is 55.68   kg CO2 pollutant per 28.34 standard cubic meters, or 0.001964 tonnes CO2/m^3 of Ngas, or 1.96 tonnes CO2/kcm Ngas. Taking this and multiplying by that handy-dandy conversion factor gives a "should be" CO2 pollutant cost (= one of the external costs of Ngas production/usage) of Euro 117/kcm of Ngas.

An Ngas powered CCGT operating at 50% thermal efficiency gets about 1 MWh from 194 m^3 (0.194 kcm/MWh) of Ngas burned, so that implies a CO2 pollutant cost of Euro 22.70/MWh. But in the graph cited by afew for the UK, the levelized CO2 pollutant cost is only about Euro 5/MW-hr (from measuring it off the graph). Add another E 17.70/MWh for a more realistic CO2 pollutant cost, that means that the net CCGT cost of making electricity is not E 31/MWh but E 48.7/MWh (approximately E 49/MWh). And if my math is correct, E 49/MWh for CCGT is more than E 35/MWh.

Funny how things become more of a moneymaker for pollution based generation (and in this case, barely) when society "allows" the profits to be privatized but keeps the costs socialized, and often unpaid. That is, until a Frankenstorm comes cruising into town, and presents a bit of the long-deferred bill with respect to CO2 pollution. So much for the Dire Straits refrain of "Money for nothin' and the chicks for free" as applied to making electricity...

But, that is not all that is bogus in this UK graph. The E 30/MWh implies a delivered price of E 156/kcm to the gas burner, which is the same as $5.69/MBtu for a delivered gas price in the US, or a wellhead price near $4.40/MBtu (sorry, that's the units I am used to...E/kcm will take a while to get used to). That may apply temporarily in the US until the fracking glut goes away this winter and the lack of Ngas well drilling sinks in (down by 75% for four years ago, and fracking wells deplete really significantly in a 4 year timeframe (often down by close to 90% or more for most wells...). In fact, the European import price today is $US 11.08/MBtu (http://ycharts.com/indicators/europe_natural_gas_price); add on pipeline transport costs and any UK CCGT plant would probably pay north of $US12/MBtu. Then add in that real CO2 pollution cost of $US 5.20/MBtu, and offshore wind would be kicking Ngas's butt. No wonder Conservatives (and Rethuglicans) hate wind energy so much...

So, even the price of Ngas is lowballed. Putting Ngas at the prices needed to keep the UK supplied completely (marginal price of Ngas), since domestic Ngas cannot totally do the job due to depletion, puts things into a different light. Wind (especially onshore wind) is totally kicking Ngas's butt with respect to a more realistic accounting...

Nb41