Energy bills are set to fall for millions of households in Britain this winter, after the country’s energy regulator told suppliers to reduce bills by 6% from October, following a drop in wholesale gas and power prices this year.

Shares in Centrica slumped as an update from the British Gas and Bord Gáis owner showed it had lost customers in its key British market.

A unique arts course on an island off the south-west coast has been saved after Cork County Council said it would double grant aid to keep it afloat.

An emergency meeting has been sought aimed at staving off the closure of an important arts course which generates around €150,000 per year for the economy of an island off the south-west coast.

SSE and the owner of Npower have reached an agreement to merge their operations to create a new energy supplier in the UK.

Energy supplier SSE and the owner of Npower are in talks about combining their operations to create a new company in the UK.

A new energy company has entered the market here, bringing greater choice of supply for electricity consumers.

Subsidy costs for British offshore windfarms are likely to fall below that of new nuclear plants in next month’s UK government auction, the head of Siemens offshore wind turbines business has said.

Cash-strapped households could see energy bill price hikes due to recent spikes in wholesale gas and electricity prices.

Cash-strapped households could see energy bill price hikes due to recent spikes in wholesale gas and electricity prices.

A nuclear power station in Britain, which faced opposition here, has moved a step closer to construction.

Électricité de France was ordered to repay €1.37bn to French authorities as the EU’s competition regulator clamps down on corporate tax loopholes.

Cork County Council has helped create 240 jobs in the past 17 months through its work with Local Enterprise Offices (LEOs).

The ECB shook markets yesterday morning, adding three Italian corporates to the list of names eligible for purchase under its quantitative easing programme.

Électricité de France (EDF) is confident of British political support to build nuclear reactors in southwest England regardless of who wins a May 7 general election.

Two huge fully equipped industrial ‘kitchens’ being developed by Cork County Council for start-up artisan food producers will be available for rental on a 24-hour basis and should be opened in the next few weeks.

Small businesses in Co Cork, especially those paying less than €3,000 annually in rates, are set get a reduction in the charge and also to benefit from a new fund set up encourage regeneration of some economically-decimated town centres.

The final go-ahead has been given by the European Commission for a new £16bn nuclear power station in the UK, according to Greenpeace.

EDF Energy is shutting down four of its nuclear power reactors as a precautionary measure after a defect was found in one of them.

There may still be six months to go to Christmas, but Cork County Council is already thinking of providing towns with a festive treat.

Britain could face at least 12 gigawatts (GW) of power plant capacity going offline by the end of 2023 due to tighter European Union pollution regulation, Reuters calculations based on government data showed yesterday.

The British government’s decision to press ahead with a vigorous expansion of nuclear power is clearly of more than a passing interest on this side of the Irish Sea.

Cork County Council and Port of Cork officials will next month meet with the 10 biggest cruise line operators visiting Ireland in an attempt to sell them more shore excursions to West Cork.

Cork County Council is to open two industrial-sized kitchens in Carrigaline before the year end which will be available to small-scale artisan food producers.

Harlequins have launched an investigation after claiming “many” of their supporters sold tickets to rival Munster fans for last Sunday’s Heineken Cup quarter-final at the Twickenham Stoop.

British Gas firm Centrica sought to deflect flak over another jump in annual profits today by flagging up its importance to the UK economy.

A European Commission report aiming to prevent a Fukushima-type disaster estimates that up to €25bn needs to be spent on Europe’s reactors to make them safe, writes Barbara Lewis

Two people have been injured in an accident at France’s oldest nuclear reactor.

More start-up “cocoon centres” for businesses are to be created in Co Cork towns and villages — where a fully equipped office can be rented for just €50 a week.

The French finance minister has unveiled a plan to cap the pay of top executives at state-owned companies at €450,000.

Bord Gáis says it can save €120m in start-up costs if it is given the task of establishing the proposed national Irish Water utility — expected to serve more than 1.5m customers by 2014.

British Prime Minister David Cameron today arrived in Paris for a summit with President Nicolas Sarkozy which will focus on nuclear energy, defence co-operation and the crisis in Syria.

Greenpeace environmental activists have stormed into the grounds of a French nuclear power plant in a “non-violent” action aimed at showing the vulnerability of atomic sites in France.

AN explosion in a furnace at the Marcoule nuclear waste treatment site in southern France yesterday killed one person, but there was no leak of radioactive material outside the site, officials said.

A worker died and another was seriously injured in an explosion at a French nuclear waste site today.

France is bringing home its citizens from Japan on government planes and is sending 100 tons of boric acid to help stem radiation leaks from a damaged nuclear plant.

BORD Gáis Energy (BGE) is to invest up to €2 million in the Irish tidal renewable energy company, OpenHydro, to develop a largescale tidal farm off the coast.

FRENCH prosecutors want to drop a highly charged case against two police officers in the electrocution deaths of two teens that sparked fiery nationwide riots in 2005, a judicial official said yesterday.

Another UK power firm was poised for foreign ownership today after International Power agreed a merger with France’s GDF Suez.

London's FTSE 100 Index slumped more than 1% today after US figures showed weaker-than-expected growth in the second quarter.

Around 170,000 miles of electrical network covering London, the South East and eastern England was sold by France’s EDF today in a deal worth £5.8bn (€6.9bn).

The FTSE 100 Index slipped more than 1% by noon today as weakness in banking stocks offset one of the London market's biggest takeover deals of recent times.