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Utility Week 21st February 2014

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utILIty WeeK | 21st - 27th February 2014 | 5 Electricity storage has got a boost with £8 million of government funding to develop a liquid air plant. Waste company Viridor and technology firm Highview got the money to develop technology that uses off-peak power to liquefy air and uses it to generate electricity at times of high demand. It is the largest of four projects to win a share of a £17 million innovation pot from the Department of Energy and Climate Change. The other three involve different types of battery storage. "The UK's antiquated transmission charging system works against investment in renewables" Paul Smith, managing director of generation at SSE. See p16 Length of the video Ofgem has launched in a bid to help consumers understand the retail Market review reforms 2 minutes Water Open Water's Fowler goes Keith Fowler has agreed to stand down as director of the Open Water programme after just seven months, following a consultation on its funding and structure by Ofwat. John Parsonage of PA Consulting has been appointed interim direc- tor of Open Water Markets, a new company set up to directly fund the Open Water initiative, which is charged with the design of the water market post-2017. A spokesman for Open Water Markets said it would soon begin recruiting for a new board, includ- ing elected representatives from industry and a new chief executive. Ofwat said in January the crea- tion of the new company would "address the programme's short-term funding and govern- ance issues". Consultation showed stakeholders wanted a separate company and board to run the programme, rather than it being operated at arm's length by Ofwat, the regulator said. Plugged in Blog "Companies that once said that when it came to trying new ideas, they wanted to be 'leaders of the following pack' are now saying they want to be trail blazers." Paul Mullord of British Water will be chairing a debate entitled "Delivering Innovation through Alliances and Partnerships AMP6" at Sustainability Live on 3 April. For more information and to book your free place, see www.sustainabilitylive.com LinkedIn Headline: Thames reservoir could protect against flooding The construction of a new reservoir in the Thames Valley could help alleviate flooding currently being experienced in the region, according to a Labour peer. Comments: Alan Bland, independent utilities professional: "Thames Water's proposed Abingdon reservoir would be a pumped storage reservoir, like most of the company's surface water storage" David Pitt, managing director of Infotec: "Insufficient is being done to maximise the existing catchment capacity" Join the discussion with Utility Week's LinkedIn group, Utility Week networking and news Feedback from utilityweek.co.uk Headline: Electricity storage: the poor cousin of the energy family climateworrier: There can be no better illustration of the incompetence of Decc than the fact that they are not pri- oritising electricity storage because their current policies are leading us towards massive constraint payments and power cuts. For every windfarm in particular there should be a mandatory requirement for additional storage to be identified to buffer the intermittency of the output. the average price rise small supplier First utility announced this week, blaming wholesale, policy and infrastructure costs 3.5% £230 million Drax's core earnings for 2013. see p19 "You can almost count on one hand the number of converted units across Europe" Dorothy Thompson, chief executive of Drax, argues biomass conversion should be treated as an emerging technology

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