SSE: fossil fuel polluter rakes in “offensive” £714mill profit

Climate campaigners have said the announcement of £715million in pre-tax profits in just six months by energy giant SSE showed that the corporate controlled energy system was “unaffordable” for both energy bills and the climate.   
 
The energy group is making profits equivalent to £3.92million every day.  
 
Despite hailing themselves as a ‘clean power champion’, SSE is behind controversial plans to build an additional power station at Peterhead which would burn gas to generate electricity until 2059, 14 years after Scotland is due to reach net zero.  
 
Fossil fuels are driving soaring energy bills and climate breakdown. Campaigners say that a new fossil fuel power station will tie people to the same volatile global gas markets for decades to come, making these twin crises worse.  
 
Expert research recently found the new Peterhead gas station could produce five times more climate pollution than the companies disclosed in its planning application. Campaigners are urging the Scottish Government to demand the companies re-do their climate assessment of the project. 
 
SSE Thermal, which operates 16 fossil fuel plants across the UK and Ireland, recorded a loss of £9million for past six months, in stark contrast to the £312million profit made in the same period last year.

SSE made £2.4billion annual profits in 2023/24, after £2.18 billion in pre-tax profits in 2022. Almost a third of all households in Scotland are living in fuel poverty. 
 
Friends of the Earth Scotland climate campaigner Alex Lee (they/them) commented, 

“SSE’s offensive profits shows that our energy system is only benefiting these greedy giants and their wealthy shareholders.  
 
“Fossil fuels are costing us the earth and are increasingly unaffordable to both people and the planet.  

“SSE’s dodgy plan to burn gas at a new Peterhead power station risks trapping us all in this rigged system with volatile prices set by international gas markets for the next 30 years or more.   
 
“SSE must come clean about the true climate impact of its plans at Peterhead, either voluntarily or being ordered to by the Scottish Government. 
 
“When the Scottish Government sees the true climate pollution of this project, the only rational response will be to reject it and focus instead on rapidly building up Scotland’s renewable energy future. “ 
ENDS