Not really. The higher proportion of renewables a country has, the more expensive the energy. See the chart on this page:

https://ca.finance.yahoo.com/news/bjorn-lomborg-solar-wind-p...

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grues-dinner 6 days ago | parent | next [-]

Alternatively, the higher the cost of non-renewable energy in a country, the more attractive renewables are in that market.

If gas costs £1 a unit and solar is 90p, solar is profitable (especially if you get paid the gas price). If gas is 50p a unit, solar isn't going to be much of an investment.

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ZeroGravitas 6 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Bjorn Lomborg is a hack propagandist and that is obviously bad science.

Just look at all the unnamed points in the lower left that are actually creating the trend he claims to have found.

If you graph developed nations the correlation reverses.

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Lio 6 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Personally, I'd take Bob Ward's analysis over Bjorn Lomborg's.

https://www.lse.ac.uk/granthaminstitute/news/more-misinforma...

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gadders 6 days ago | parent [-]

I'd like to see them debate. All I know is my energy cost keeps going up in the UK, and we seem to have some of the most expensive energy in the world.

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frabcus 6 days ago | parent | next [-]

Have you tried switching to Agile Octopus tariff? My electricity cost has gone down 1/3rd since I did that. I also installed smart radiator thermostats, and knocked about 1/3rd off gas heating cost.

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Lio 6 days ago | parent | prev [-]

We do and I share your concerns.

As far as I can see pricing electricity on the marginal costs of gas has not been a good strategy. I think we should be charged the true cost of generation which is something like 8 times lower for renewables.

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tialaramex 6 days ago | parent [-]

The question is, if I'm going to be paid only "true cost of generation" why would I perform any generation? I also don't want to be paid only "true cost of labour" for my work, I'll take the wages you offered thanks, not my "true cost".

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Lio 6 days ago | parent [-]

Sorry, maybe "market rate" would be better phrasing on my part.

I assume there's a mark up in there even if I didn't say it.

My point is that base cost of gas is so much higher than renewable energy that we are crippling our economy by forcing the renewable engergy market rate to be based on the market price of gas.

	▲	tialaramex 5 days ago \| parent [-]
		What "renewable energy market" ? Are you mistaking "green" consumer electricity tariffs for actually renewable energy ? It's all the same electrons, and if you don't pay for the gas then those gas turbines don't run, which means there's no electricity. What we have is a single electricity market because electricity consumers do not care how this electricity was made. Their motors spin, their lamps light, it's the same whether we burned peat (which is very, very bad for the environment) or strung together a lot of photovoltaics and made the sun's light into electricity directly.

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triceratops 6 days ago | parent | prev [-]

Fires burn wherever firefighters show up, it's weird.