Live blogged: The UK's new energy future

Read how Chris Huhne set out the government's plan for cutting the UK's carbon emissions, while keeping the lights on, at a price people can afford. Plus: all the reaction


The sun is setting on the UK's liberalised electricity market, with government interventions to ensure sufficient low-carbon energy will be generated to meet targets for cuts in greenhouse gas emissions. Photograph: Anthony Devlin/PA

This live blog has now ended. You jump straight to my sum up, if you like, or just read through in chronological order.

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2.54pm: At 3.30pm today, the UK's secretary of state for energy and climate change, Chris Huhne, is going to set out how he thinks the nation can meet the three "Cs" of energy in the 21st century: carbon, cost and continuity of supply. The challenge, in other words, is to cut the greenhouse gas emissions that stoke global warming, while keeping the lights on at a price people can afford. It's the biggest reform in quarter of a century, and will reverse the free market set up by Margaret Thatcher, which has failed to invest for the future.

In my preview, I wrote that the government decided long ago that new nuclear power stations are crucial to meeting the "trilemma" of the 3 Cs, and all sides of the debate agree this is the central aim of the complex measures set out in the white paper. The details are pretty technical – contracts for difference and so on – but this piece walks you through the labyrinth.

The key questions to be answered are, I think:

• What will it cost energy customers? The UK's creaking energy infrastructure and global fuel prices mean that energy prices are going up whether it's coal, gas, oil, nuclear or renewables. But the higher the cost, the more hard-pressed consumers will object, making it less likely future ministers will stick to the plans.

• Are there incentives for energy efficiency? Crucial, as reducing demand is very often cheaper than increasing supply, to cutting waste will help keep bills down.

• Is there help for new entrants to the market? The UK's big six supply 99% of the energy. Huhne has promised to help break this up, but how? Again it is important for cost: more competition means lower prices.

• Which of the UK's big six energy companies is happy? This will tell you which electricity generation technologies got the best deal. EDF back nuclear, SSE back renewables.

• Is there any obligation to build renewables? If not, gas looks an easier, cheaper alternative.

I'll post some thoughts from elsewhere in the run up to Huhne's speech in the House of Commons. But please let me know your thoughts in the comments below, or via Twitter. I am @dpcarrington.