Utilities Shut 12% of Europe's Gas-Fed Stations in 2013
Utilities shut down 12% of Europe’s generation fleet last year, according to a study by Oxford University. Ten of the biggest utilities mothballed 21.3 gigawatts of gas-fed stations in 2013 as a result of changed market conditions.
“Utilities have completely failed to anticipate changing carbon prices, coal prices, and the impact of renewables deployment and how these could affect the economics of gas investments,” Ben Caldecott, director at Oxford University’s Smith School of Enterprise and Environment, said to Bloomberg on Thursday.
The evidences are coherent with a recent report by consultancy Capgemini.
According to the 15th European Energy Market Observatory report, 130,000 MW of gas plants across Europe (around 60% of the total installed gas fired generation in the Region) are currently not recovering their fixed costs and are at a risk of closure by 2016.