London (Platts)--21Apr2009

The UK government will miss its targets to boost the share of renewable
electricity by 2010 and 2020, according to latest forecasts from consultants
Cambridge Econometrics Tuesday.

And an EU target for the UK to source 15% of all its energy (electricity,
heat and transport) from renewables by 2020 looks impossible, with Camecon
suggesting the percentage will be only 1.5% in that year.

The consultants said that renewables will account for around 6% of UK
electricity sales to final users by 2010, below the 10% target. By 2015 the
share of renewables in UK power sales could reach 9.5%, but that would be
short of the 15% target set by the government's renewables obligation, which
compels suppliers to source a set percentage of their sales from green power,
or pay a fine. By 2020 green power could reach a 13.5% market share.

These figures mean the government will find it impossible to meet its
European Union-imposed target of sourcing 15% of all energy (electricity, heat
and transport) from renewable sources by 2020. Since heat and transport rely
on gas and oil, that target would imply sourcing up to 35% of electricity from
renewables.

"Our forecast suggests that the far more ambitious target set by the
European Commission of a 15% contribution of renewable energy to the UK's
overall final energy needs by 2020 is, on current policies, also likely to be
missed by a wide margin," Camecon said.

"We expect the share of renewable energy in final energy consumption to
rise from the current level of under 1% to 1.25% in 2010, rising to just under
1.5% in 2015 and remaining at around that level to 2020."
--Alex Froley, alex_froley@platts.com