A leaked report shows wind is the cheapest energy source in Europe, beating the presumably dirt-cheap coal and gas by a mile. Conventional wisdom holds that clean energy is more expensive than its fossil-fueled counterparts. competition.
Wind power is cheaper than coal
Subsidies and costs of EU energy
http://ec.europa.eu/energy/studies/doc/20141013_subsidies_costs_eu_energy.pdf
Yet cost comparisons show that renewable energy sources are often cheaper than their carbon-heavy. The report (PDF) demonstrates that if you were to take into account mining, pollution, and adverse health impacts of coal and gas, wind power would be the cheapest source of energy.
The way energy markets function and the effect of government interventions in the European Union
has been the subject of much debate in recent years. To date however, there has not been a complete dataset for the EU28 detailing the Government interventions in the energy market.
This report presents the results of a study commissioned by DG Energy to quantify the extent of public interventions in energy markets in all 28 Member States for all energy use excluding transport. One of the reasons Governments have to intervene in energy markets is that the market does not
adequately price external costs such as environmental damages...
Original: Wind power is cheaper than coal, 70pp