Utility Week

Community Win some, lose some Many Brits will idle away the odd few minutes every now and then daydreaming about a win on the EuroMillions. I mean, what would you do with a hundred million quid? Well, if your name is Einar Aas you already know the answer to that one: you'd gam- ble (disastrously as it happens) on energy futures. Einar is a Norwegian energy trader and until recently one of the country's richest men. In fact, he's so rich that he could trade directly on the Nasdaq energy market without having to go through a clearing house. He hit the business pages last week when a series of highly leveraged bets on Nordic power prices went south. As things started to fall apart, he had to pay in €36 million to maintain his positions but then things took a dramatic turn for the worse and he defaulted. The end result is that not only is Einar facing personal bankruptcy, but the stability fund maintained by the clear- ing houses has had to make good €100 million of his losses: a figure that represents two- thirds of the entire fund. It has le many wondering how on earth a sole private trader could amass such mind- boggling losses, particularly coming as it does in the same week as the tenth anniversary of the collapse of Lehman Brothers. The rich, as always, play by different rules. Get back in your cage It's not all doom and gloom for the less well-off, though, notes Disconnector cheerily. Those nice folk over at Amazon have conceded that putting workers into robot- controlled cages so they can be quickly moved around their warehouses is "a bad idea" and the company won't now be pur- suing the development of the system, which even in the grim world of Amazon employment must surely count as a win. One of the world's biggest companies will have to make do with tracking workers' movements by making them wear wristbands with micro- chips and feeding the data into a semi-sentient super- computer. You know, the old- fashioned way. Lavatory humour Neither is it just manual work- ers having a hard time of it. Office workers, too, are far from happy, judging by the fact that one in three of them admits to going to the loo even if they didn't need to use the facilities, just for a break. On average, we spend 15 minutes a day in the loo. That was the verdict of a survey of 2,000 office work- ers carried out by a company called Initial Washroom Hygiene (they sell office loo- cleaning services). All of which must be costing employers a fortune. Someone should invent a machine to keep an eye on that – over to you, Amazon. The rise of the machines As it happens, many office toilets could become redun- dant anyway, if a new report from the World Economic Forum called Future of Jobs 2018 is correct. It reckons that over half of all jobs will be undertaken by robots and artificial intelligence by 2025, which it isn't long. Further, as many as 54 per cent of the global workforce will require retraining to take on new roles as machines rise. What exactly those jobs will be is another question, of course. Not that the great man is worried, as it happens. He's got a mate who can get him in at a start-up called Skynet, so the future's looking rosy! Disconnector Publishing director, Utilities: Ellen Bennett, t: 01342 332084, e: ellenbennett@fav-house.com; Acting editor: Suzanne Heneghan, t: 01342 332106, e: suzanneheneghan@fav-house.com Acting content director: Denise Chevin, 01342 332087, denisechevin@fav-house.com; Deputy editor: Jane Gray (maternity leave); Features editor: Lois Vallely, t: 01342 332080, e: loisvallely@fav-house.com; News editor: Katey Pigden, t: 01342 332082, e: kateypigden@ fav-house.com; Content editor: Alice Cooke, t: 01342 332102, e: alicecooke@fav-house.com; Energy correspondent: Tom Grimwood, t: 01342 332061, e: tomgrimwood@fav-house.com; Policy correspondent: David Blackman, e: davidblackman@fav-house.com; Reporter: Adam John, t: 01342 332069, e: adamjohn@fav-house.com; Business development manager: Ben Hammond, e: benhammond@fav-house.com. t: 01342 332116; Business development executive: Sarah Wood, e: sarahwood@ fav-house.com. t: 01342 332117 Conference sponsorship manager: Sophie Abbott, t: 01342 332062, e: sophieabbott@ fav-house.com; General enquiries: 01342 332000; Membership enquiries: Peter Bissell, t: 01342 332057, e: peterbissell@fav-house.com. ISSN: 1356-5532. Registered as a newspaper at the Post Office. 2,500 Average circulation Jan–Dec 2017 Membership subscriptions: UK £769+VAT per year. Overseas £781 per year. Contact Peter Bissell on: 01342 332057 Utility Week is a member of the Independent Press Standards Organisation (which regulates the UK's magazine and newspaper industry). We abide by the Editors' Code of Practice and are committed to upholding the highest standards of journalism. If you think that we have not met those standards and want to make a complaint please contact the publishing director, Ellen Bennett, at ellenbennett@fav-house.com. If we are unable to resolve your complaint, or if you would like more information about IPSO or the Editors' Code, contact IPSO on 0300 123 2220 or visit www.ipso.co.uk UTILITY WEEK | 21ST - 27TH SEPTEMBER 2018 | 31 Sarah Merrick @SpeakSarahSpeak The UK has just reached 20GW of installed wind capacity. That's 9,088 turbines, enough to power 14 million homes. Bryony Worthington @bryworthington Great achievement and testimony to the power of policy. Investable policy more to the point. Ministers and other sectors take note. Léonie Greene #FBPE @LeonieGreene How do governments get themselves in these weird places? While popular #solar is suppressed, forcing unpopular fracking on communities sparks Conservative rebellion. Anyone surprised? Claire Spedding @ClaireSpedding New electricity system operator identity is launched today! Follow @ng_eso for everything electricity system operator related. National Grid ESO @ng_eso Hello! We're the new National Grid electricity system operator @ng_eso. William Marchant @richonlyinname Anyone else at the BIEE conference? If you'd like a coffee/conversation/sordid affair, do say hello. I'm the unkempt man who looks socially awkward. I appreciate that's not narrowing things down much at an energy conference. Rebecca Long-Bailey @RLong_Bailey The UK's first windfarm came online in 1991. Today there is enough capacity to power millions of homes. But we can do better. A Labour government will go further, faster to see in the energy revolution. guynewey @guynewey One of the thorniest problems for the energy sector as it moves to more decentralised and zero-marginal cost technology is who pays for the fixed costs (networks, environmental and social costs, etc). Matt Finch @mattfinch00 There are some people out there who think #ElectricVehicle policy and combustion vehicle policy are different things. They are not. A good EV policy should be aimed squarely at discouraging combustion vehicles. Top Tweets

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