As we move towards the end of a long hot, dry summer, with several heatwaves across some (but not all) parts of the UK and wildfires which, though mostly started by accidents or by arsonists, are inevitably blamed on climate change, it feels strange to see vindication hurtling towards we net zero and climate sceptics.

The BBC and the Guardian and all the rest of them are doubling down on the doom narrative, but reality has an awkward way of making its effects felt. This is the third time I have recorded that pennies are starting to drop. More than eighteen months ago I reported on a slot on BBC Radio 4’s PM programme that allowed the problems of winter dunkelflautes to be explored. A few days later I reported on another slot on PM that gave airspace to the reality that net zero and renewable energy are causing UK electricity bills to rise to dangerous levels that are endangering the viability of British businesses. We’ve had to wait a little over eighteen months for a really big penny to drop, but it seems to have just done so.

The cynic in me wonders if, now that we have a new Prime Minister and a new Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero, the focus is shifting from Net Zero towards Energy Security. Perhaps, thinking cynically again, the government has started briefing the media about a pivot back towards gas and the need to ensure that we maintain gas supplies. I assume that there has been a lot of chatter between ministers and journalists regarding the government paper “Gas System in Transition: Security of Supply – Interim Response” published yesterday (“the Report”). Having spent years deliberately making gas more expensive (so as to make expensive electricity seem relatively less expensive), suddenly (albeit very belatedly) there seems to be an understanding in high places that we are still going to need gas for a long time to come and that there is a danger that it might not be there when we need it. The fact that this is the direct result of policy decisions made to support the Net Zero agenda means that politicians with red faces need to find a solution that doesn’t explicity acknowledge the cause of the problem. Sadly, as so often seems to be the case, it seems that the solution may be to throw money (lots of taxpayers’ money) at the problem to try to make it go away (and to make sure the gas doesn’t go away).

So much for the generalities and my cynical take on them. The reality is that yesterday, Nils Pratley, writing in the Guardian produced an article with the heading “Ministers are waking up to Britain’s gas supply risks. It’s time for decisions” and a sub-heading “Despite declining consumption, the country will still need lots of gas in coming years but solutions aren’t forthcoming”.

He went on to use my own language, his opening paragraph being as follows:

The penny is dropping in government. Britain, even in rapid energy transition mode, will still need a lot of gas in the years ahead – and needs to know how the gas will arrive.

He pointed out that 24 million UK households have a gas connection, mostly for heating, and that “the pace of heat pumps adoption is miserable”. He then produces the remarkable (but true) statistic that gas still provides one-third of the UK’s energy needs – a fact that is conveniently overlooked by net zero enthusiasts who seem to think that the proportion of electricity generated by renewables is the important statistic. How often have we heard and seen energy being conflated with electricity? As Mr Pratley goes on to point out “[t]hough annual consumption is in decline, the days of peak use during a bleak midwinter can still be as high as ever.”

This is borne out by the most recent Government data I have been able to find, namely the UK Energy Trends data for January to March 2026, which was released on 30^th June 2026. This tells us that:

Gas demand decreased by 5.1 per cent in Quarter 1 2026 compared to Quarter 1 2025, driven by a 17 per cent decrease in gas used for electricity generation, due in part to record levels of wind generation displacing gas. Gas demand by final consumers was stable in Quarter 1 2026 compared to Quarter 1 2025. Consumption by the industrial and services sectors (which includes commercial and public administration) decreased by 7.1 and 5.3 per cent respectively. Demand by domestic (household) users, which makes up the largest proportion of final consumption, increased by 2.5 per cent despite warmer temperatures this year compared with last.

I will be interested to see what the data for the second and third quarters look like in due course, because I have noticed that during this spring and summer gas seems to have been riding to the rescue quite a lot in terms of keeping the lights on when wind and solar generation have faltered.

But back to Mr Pratley and the Guardian. If his analysis is correct it offers a damning indictment of politicians and indeed of officials at DESNZ:

The difficulty has been getting ministers to focus on the combination of declining North Sea volumes (about 40% of supply), skimpy levels of gas storage and limited capacity for importing the stuff via tanker. Until now, the default position under successive governments has been that the market will provide.

But how and why would the market provide? Gas producers are being clobbered with penal rates of “windfall” tax, and increasing levels of artifical carbon costs are being loaded on to the price of gas. Politicians have interfered with the market to the point where it is close to collapse. BP has recentlyannounced a decision to pull out of the North Sea as a result, to name just one consequence of these dangerous and foolish policies.

And now it seems that “the government thinks it will probably have to intervene to ensure sufficient gas capacity and infrastructure is in place. That could mean contracts to underpin more storage, more import terminals or something else.”

Mr Pratley makes three main observations regarding the Report. First, he recognises the sense of urgency that is required and urges ministers to get on with sorting this out. He notes that Michael Shanks, the Energy Minister whose name appears on the Report, didn’t set out a timetable for the next steps. Whatever the solution to potential gas shortages, the situation is urgent. “Get on with it”, he says.

Second, we are faced with particular urgency in the form of the winter that will soon be upon us. Worryingly, the Report doesn’t mention the challenge that this represents. For instance, Centrica isn’t busy filling the Rough storage facility, and continental European storage, which the UK might seek to fall back on to help us out, is projected to be lower than average.

Third, Mr Pratley seems to suggest that the government should get on and authorise the Jackdaw gas field exploitation to commence:

It would, after all, be bizarre to outline a potential supply crunch that has been caused, in large part, by growing reliance on imports, and then disallow a field that will make the problem slightly smaller. Jackdaw will account for about 6% of domestic North Sea gas volumes and could be up and running in time for winter.

Mr Pratley’s whole article is a welcome breath of fresh air compared to the usual drivel with which the Guardian bombards us. Things must be getting pretty desperate if even Guardian journalists (albeit Mr Pratley is certainly one the Guardian’s better contributors) can see the looming danger.

The Telegraph article today goes one step further. Where Mr Pratley urges Ministers to “get on with it”, the Telegraph seems to think that they have already decided to do so. The heading to its article is “Labour plans multi-billion-pound gas subsidies to keep lights on – Taxpayers face double whammy of funding renewables and fossil fuel backup after energy firms threaten to scale back capacity.”

Whether the firmness of this headline is justified at this stage remains to be seen, although I note that page of the Report contains this:

…government recognises that changes are needed to help build a commercial landscape that provides sufficient incentives for existing gas supply infrastructure to continue to meet exceptional peaks in demand. A long-term commercial model in the form of financial or revenue support may be required.

Certainly, the author of the Telegraph article noticed this too and highlights it in their piece. They also spotted the paragraph at the foot of page 8:

It was also evident that the costs of bringing a strategic gas storage reserve or an FSRU would likely be in the billions of pounds across a 25-year timeline. Government is therefore keen to understand what role it could play to help industry bring such an asset to market, or whether there is a case that can be made for government to bring these to market directly. As above, further analysis and work with the sector is required before providing an initial position on these options in the full consultation response.

All this is an absolute gift to Reform UK. As I regularly opine, I am no supporter of that political party (far from it), but on this issue I am sure it has the right of it. The Telegraph quotes Richard Tice thus:

[He] said the plans showed that “the Government has lost the plot” in its pursuit of net zero targets.

He said: “First they subsidise renewables heavily. Then they realise the wind does not always blow nor the sun always shine and we have huge blackout risk.

“So now they subsidise gas to billions of pounds to act as backup. The result is households being fleeced by vast subsidies to investors who cannot believe their luck.”

Quite. He might have added that many, if not most, of those investors, are foreign, whose depradations are yet another factor – to add to Net Zero – with regard to the UK’s adverse balance of payments figures. Something needs to change, and urgently. Only when the final (as opposed to the interim) Report is published will we know whether the change of senior personnel within the government will see the necessary changes being implemented.

Meanwhile, I expect we will continue to wait for many years indeed before we see the promised annual reduction of £300 in our energy bills.