Gaslighting finds a whole new meaning with this energy crisis

One of my favourite Oscar acceptance speeches was made by Ingrid Bergman when she thanked the judges for her 1944 best actress award and said quietly, “I hope that in the future I’ll be worthy of it”. The Oscar was for her role in Gaslight, a psychological thriller about a husband who manipulates his wife to convince her she is going mad.

The film also gave us “gaslighting”, a buzzword used relentlessly today to describe ploys to undermine someone’s self-belief and make them doubt reality. No one could have predicted how fantastically apt the term would become as countries across Europe struggle to contain a dire energy crisis.

Gas certainly lies at the heart of this problem. Prices have surged to more than 10 times their normal level as the post-pandemic economic recovery drove up demand and Russia, the largest natural gas exporter, squeezed supplies to countries supporting Ukraine.

Record summer heatwaves sent electricity use into overdrive and now, with winter nearing, governments face the threat of skyrocketing power and heating bills, blackouts, business failures and recession.

It is hard to think of a more brutal example of the dangers of relying on imported fossil fuels. It has never been clearer that ministers should have heeded calls made years ago to hasten net zero policies for more efficient energy use and homegrown green power plants, which ease dependence on gas. Renewable electricity displaced about £6bn worth of gas in the UK alone last year, the centre-right think-tank, Onward, estimates.

Yet guess what a growing number of political figures are blaming for the gathering energy disaster? That’s right. Net zero. In a striking effort to distort reality, the longer the gas-driven energy crisis goes on, the more critics condemn net zero. This is — literally — gaslighting, and it is especially evident in the UK, which became the first major economy to pass a net zero emissions law in 2019.

“Westminster’s selfish obsession with net zero” is set to leave people “colder and poorer”, Richard Tice, former Brexit Party chair, claimed this year.

Attorney-General, Suella Braverman, kicked off her shortlived bid to replace Boris Johnson in the latest Conservative leadership contest last month by saying: “To deal with the energy crisis we need to suspend the all-consuming desire to achieve net zero by 2050” or we’ll end up with “net zero growth”.

Braverman is tipped for a government post if the contest’s frontrunner, Liz Truss, becomes prime minister. So is Lord Frost, a former Brexit minister who wrote this month that “net zero proponents” had shaped an energy system that “means we face blackouts, hideous business-crushing costs, and people shivering and dying in the cold”.

This is breathtaking. Yes, average annual UK household energy bills are forecast to soar above £5,000 next year, more than twice their current level. And yes, NHS leaders are consequently warning of a “humanitarian crisis” if people have to choose between eating and heating in the winter months.

But the driving force here is not net zero policies. It’s gas. Spiralling prices have had a sharp impact in the UK, where most households rely on gas boilers for heating and gas-fired power stations generate about 40 per cent of electricity.

The gas industry knows this. Charles McAllister, director of policy at the UK Onshore Oil and Gas industry group, argues that the energy crisis demonstrates the need to end a 2019 moratorium on shale gas fracking in England. But unlike Braverman, he does not blame net zero. As he told me last week: “The cause of this increase in energy price is not net zero, it is the wholesale price of natural gas.”

It is true that household energy bills include green levies that pay for renewables projects and anti-fuel poverty schemes. But these charges account for just 8 per cent of typical bills and even that share is expected to fall further as wholesale prices rise.

It is also true that net zero does not come for free. Integrating green energy into grids designed for fossil fuels requires investment. So does insulating homes and rolling out electric car charging networks.

There are, however, big pay-offs. UK households with a heat pump, electric car and better insulation have been saving an average £1,000 a year by some estimates.

Ultimately, blaming net zero for a gas-fuelled energy crisis is not just gaslighting, it is dangerous. Any policymaker manipulated into believing that slower net zero progress is the answer to energy market shocks is wrong. Those who understand reality should not be forced to bear the cost of their delusions.

pilita.clark@ft.com