The shale gas revolution: green taxes will mean sky-high prices for dirt-cheap energy

Christopher Booker,Telegraph
" What Kennedy omitted to mention (and Humphrys failed to pick him up on) was that, from next April, the Government will be imposing its swingeing new “carbon tax” on every ton of CO2 emitted by producing electricity from fossil fuels, rapidly rising from £16 a ton to £70 by 2030. In all the media’s obsession with how fast our energy bills are rising, this is scarcely ever mentioned. But this tax alone will add billions a year to our bills. Within 17 years, it will be well on the way to doubling them. And of course it will apply just as much to electricity from shale gas as it will to that produced by the coal-fired power stations, currently producing nearly half our electricity, which the Government wants to drive out of business as soon as possible.
So, at just the time when the Government reluctantly holds out to us the prospect that the gas we will need to keep our lights on might become very much cheaper, it will be imposing this new tax to make it very much more expensive, thus cancelling out much of the financial benefit shale gas could bring us. The very failure of Mr Kennedy and the BBC to mention this underlines, yet again, just how insane our energy policy has become."