Sustainability in Surrey ?

Energy Usage in Surrey

Energy Production. Surrey has no known reserves of hydrocarbons suitable for use as fuels (coal, oil).
There is negligible use of renewable energies such as wind generators or turbines for hydo electricity. There is some use of wood for heating, but there is a danger of air quality decreasing if wood is burned on a large scale.

Energy Usage.
My estimate of the fuel used by private cars in Surrey is 2.2 million barrels.
(= 350,000 tons of petrol/diesel). This estimate excludes fuel used by commercial vehicles and public transport. (and it also excludes the through traffic on the motorways). I estimate this as 25% extra.

I also estimate that a similar amount of fuel is used in the forms of gas and electricity in each of A - homes and B - commercial premises (a total of a further 700,000 tons of petrol/diesel - the price of this is lower as there is less fuel tax)

One approach to estimating the domestic use of fuel is to note that there are 430,000 households in Surrey according to the 2001 census (Surrey CC site)

The average uSwitch visitor can reduce their typical annual electricity bill of £260 per year by £40, and can reduce the typical annual gas bill of £320 by £75 simply by comparing gas and electric prices and switching to the best provider for their needs. (link to Uswitch)

From this, the average household fuel bill should be £465 /year
For Surrey, this gives a total domestic fuel bill of just under £200 million - bills for commercial premises should be added to this for a Surrey grand total !!

These figures show a massive imbalance between usage and production.

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click to enlarge
Pylons across the Ashtead Common NNR

In Surrey,

• we use about 350,000 tons of oil for private vehicles
• The cost of this is about £440 million
• we use 700,000 tons of oil for domestic and business (as gas, electricity, coal, etc.)
• the domestic fuel bill for Surrey is about £200 million, based on 430,000 housel holds with average fuel bills of £465/year