^Qwerty^

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-23093581

I suspect he'll be eating big slices of humble pie in a couple of years or so.

You can't keep closing power stations down, not replace them with anything and expect the lights to stay on, unless I'm missing something? As for bringing mothballed plants back in to action, even if possible in the time scales that electricty demand requires, how would that sit with the emission targets, or is somebody actually going to grow some and give a big finger to the EU?

dpb

Is he relying on fracking?

alcazar

iTrader: (2)

I have a good mate who works in this business.

He reckons that Thatcher's "Dash for Gas", and the subsequent using up of our gas supplies, followed by huge price hikes from those who HAVE gas, (who'd have thought it???), and now years of Lying Labour namby-pamby-ism towards so-called green policies, has left us high and dry.
He reckons that no matter what the government say, there will HAVE to be power rationing within the next three years.......

BTW: we are the ONLY European country in this position. And we STILL sit on a mountain of coal, most of it now, out of reach...thanks again Thatcher, you old cow.

ReallyReallyGoodMeat

Good time to buy shares in solar panel manufacturers perhaps?

^Qwerty^

Pretty much what I'm hearing as well. Have neighbours who work at Drax and Ferrybridge. The guy from Drax says we came close to the brink a few years ago when we had that prolonged spell of high pressure, clear blue skies, no wind and it was very cold all over the country, most of Europe was in the exact same position as well. So all those nice tall windmill things did sweet FA.
Move forward a few years, and if the same perfect storm occurred again, we've closed down some coal and oil fuel stations so don't have the capacity to cover demand. There is only one possible result and that’s a developed nation having power cuts. What a sad state of affairs.

A large Data Centre operator in London has also been told by the grid to expect power cuts from 2015 onwards.

The coal situation bugs me, but the unions needed breaking and Scargill fell for it. Prior to that, we had power cuts once or twice a week anyway due to strikes. Scared for life I am, as Blue Peter went off air

warrenm2

*sigh* So when we were using that gas it was cheap and hence we benefited from low energy costs. Now we buy gas on the world market and these "huge price hikes" are in fact the market price in response to demand, rather than a pricing fixing scam you seem to be implying.

We can easily get the coal out now, the problem is how much it costs to do so. It is still cheaper to import gas. You do want the cheapest energy possible don't you? Or do you prefer some knee jerk political rant?

There is a problem with energy supply though. The problem is the EU and the large combustion plant directive which is closing down coal fired stations (which typically produce 40-50% of the UKs energy), all in the name of "being green", and replacing them with windmills. This is the real problem, and one that you should be getting irate about. It has been predicted for years, and so it is coming to pass. It is "climate change" policies such as the 2008 Act that are the problem here, not a politician's decision to fight Unions nearly 30 years ago. Get over yourself FFS

ALi-B

iTrader: (1)

And to think all of these new houses we built in the Labour boom...many of which tapping off existing grid supplies. Did nobody think they'd need more powerstations to power all of these extra homes?

As Warran says, we aren't allowed to use coal like we used to. Well not unless we jump out of the EU, and tear up the Kyoto agreement. Which I have no problem doing, but we'll upset a few global empires doing that and the ramifications will be the breakdown of other more beneficial agreements that we have.

And are we teh only ones with a problem? ...NO we are not!! Where I spend alot of time in Spain..the winters in the area I frequent regularly reach -5 degrees C. Nearly everyone uses electric for heat. Guess what happens? Yep...as soon as it even hints at snowing (which it does..yes Southern Spain does have snow...and ski resorts), Spaniads flick on all their heaters (they feel the cold...I see them in thick coats when its 15degrees and sunny - I'm in shorts and t-shirts ).

The result is nearly daily the power goes off as the local substations can't handle the load. When I'm in the local town, power is fed via overhead cables...the ones going between tower blocks are steaming! (well I think its steam, at least ).
The reason for all this is the due to the property boom, which resulted in far more construction than teh UK, with the same disregard for the water and power supply, but on a wider scale.

The point being other countries have had power issues for quite some time, and they just carry on as usual. Yet we're the ones panicking over it. Why?


Even France decided to turn off all their street lights in many large towns and cities for financial reasons. If they can do it, why can't we do it too? I personally rather pay less council tax than endure the orange glow over my town. Its a waste of energy and resources anyway IMO.


Anyhoo whats teh big deal of a big power cut? I have LED laterns, a inverter, a huge 110AH battery. I can put a 3pin plug on the boiler so I can still use it to get heat+hot water in the winter and still have reserve to power the TV. The Hob runs on gas. So really the net incovienience for me is I can't use the tumble dryer LOL.

dsmith

...or indeed the Unions clear decision to fight the politicians (which is closer to the mark - Just Thatcher decided enough was enough and stood up to them, unlike the previous labour government)

neil-h

From a mining town are we?

The countries potential energy issues have sod all to do with Thatchers handling of the coal mines. We're in the situation we're in because of a big lack of infraststructure investment. As the OP said you can't go decommissioning power stations and not replace them.

alcazar

iTrader: (2)

Not from a mining town, no, but with some knowledge of mines and coal mining that others on here seem not to share...warren?

We haven't decommissioned too many power stations, but we HAVE mothballed quite a few almost new gas-fired ones due to the price of gas...three near to me, for a start.

They weren't cheap to build, either, but my, was Thatcher having them, or wasn't she?
At the time, she was told it was a crazy idea to waste our natural gas supplies producing electricity with it, but overruled everyone...just to spite the miners.

So anyone who thinks our present crisis isn't at least part down to the old witch needs to do some reading.

As for easy to extract coal..NO, it's not, not once you've closed the mine.

Once you do that, what WAS a terribly dangerous job becomes stupidly dangerous, the technology to do it just doesn't exist.

Unless you know better?

as for gas prices...of course it's political. The people WITH the gas supplies are selling it at top dollar and have already cut off one country due to political infighting.

Of course, one of our problems is that the privatised energy companies are French, German etc and are using UK prices to subsidise their home market...tell me again who privatised gas and electricity?

And while you are telling us, perhaps YOU could get over YOURself, ffs or not ffs?

neil-h

Tbh, coal fired power was bound to die a death sooner or later. If Thatcher hadn't killed it then Kyoto (and it's successors) would have.

As you say, gas is a touch more complicated because of the economics involved. So I'll happily leave that one.

Realistically rather than arsing about with wind farms the money would have been far better invested in nuclear and to some extent subsidising solar for new build.

hodgy0_2

can you explain how the market in gas works

I though 90% of the actual product comes from Russia, which would mean very little actual competition or "market"

except for artificially traded ones

alcazar

iTrader: (2)

So.........how come the Germans have just given the finger to the EC, announced the closure of their nuclear plants, and the building of more coal fired power stations?

warrenm2

OK. It seems you are full of opinions but no evidence. I shall start (and probably end) by giving you http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/n...t-written.html 3 coal fired stations closing down due to political greeny legislation. Costs mounting because of carbon taxes, more greeny nonsense. All of this is a self induced crisis because of "global warming"

As for gas supplies and being held at ransom... http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/n...-UK-homes.html

As for your rant about generoators being foreign owned, so what? They are price capped by ofgen, there is competition. They put in the investment so of course they should get the return. What's you problem? If its the overall price, then once again for the hard of understanding I refer you to the renewables surcharge, another green tax on fuel bills.

alcazar

iTrader: (2)

What's your point, warren, other than trying to make yourself look clever?

I agree that greeny taxes and targets are at the root of it now, but you seem to ignore my other points to try and make some pro-Thatcher statement.

warrenm2

You say trying to look clever, I say providing supporting evidence, obviously something that is an alien idea to you.

The overall point is that the energy crisis is brought about by green issues and policies rather than market fixing or "Thatcher"

alcazar

iTrader: (2)

Nonsense. Just quoting something from the telegraph isn't evidence. If you could be bothered, you could find evidence for my points too.

I can't be bothered to do so, but they are no less true, whether you like it or not....

Utter bullcr@p, sorry for my french.

Who privatised the leccy and gas?
Who closed the mines that COULD have supplied us with coal for another 200 years, at present usage rate, figures from just before the miner's strike?
Who dashed for gas, so using up all our supplies to prove a point.
Whose government CAME UP WITH global warming?

She is as much to blame, maybe more, than all the stupid greeny policies.

Back to your shrine to Thatch, my good man.

Keep telling us she's not to blame...maybe YOU might believe it one day, I certainly won't.

neil-h

Politics. Nuclear power isn't popular in Germany at the moment, hence closing all the nuclear plants is a hugely popular move and a potential vote winner.

Alcazar, I have to ask. Why are you so keen on coal power?

alcazar

iTrader: (2)

I didn't say I was.

What I am annoyed about is successive politicians who have, seemingly, knowingly gone further and further down a road that can ONLY lead to power cuts for the UK, and all for some political dogma.

And while we live on an island of coal, why NOT exploit it? There is clean-burn technology now, why NOT?

Personally, I'd have loved to have seen several large tidal barrages built, with the added links that they could carry, roads, rail etc, but nope...wind it is...or rather, isn't.

But hey...no money changed hands, and no Labour ministers, MP's or supporters will be getting rich off the back of it... muahahahahahahahahahaha.

^Qwerty^

Concur. The task of opening up old workings is a magnitude more dangerous than driving new ones. Even working around old seams is a perilous task and accurate diagrams of where old road ways are is critical to avoid a sudden ingress of water that would potentially kill those around it and of course, flood the mine.
For example, I understand that the workings at Kellingley are very close to that of the old Askern Colliery. Frequent surveys of the Askern pit bottom take place to ensure it hasn’t filled with water, although I expect the methane plant would stop working if it had?

I also have a conspiracy theory………
At the time that Hatfield colliery reopened to work the Barnsley seam, Thorne still had its headstocks and was kept on C+M, the plan to reopen it at some point. Thorne was very badly prone to flooding due to an issue with one of the shafts (can’t remember which one). By turning off the pumps and flooding the old workings at Thorne, UKC effectively ‘put beyond use’ millions of tonnes of coal which could have been accessed from Hatfield. The two were/are linked underground at some point, but god knows how you’d open up that link to extract the water without flooding all the working at Hatfield.

neil-h

At last something we can agree on The amount of money that's been thrown at wind power is comical at best and there are people out there who have done very well from it. Yet with seemingly no help toward the countries potential energy deficit.

jonc

Well this is utter b0llocks too. Check your history. More mines were closed under Wilson's Labour Government before Thatcher came into power. There's no denying that the coal industry was costing this country vast sums of money and despite number of open pits, we were still experiencing power cuts. What Thatcher did with the millitant union running the coal industry was what this country needed. Scargill was equal in the demise of the industry and use the miners for his own political gains. This country would not have seen the growth and prosperity had the unions and the uncompetitive coal industry had remained in place. EU legislation meant polluting power stations had to go so mining for coal was pointless and not cost effective if there was a diminishing demand for it. The coal fired power stations should have been replaced with a mixture of nuclear and renewable. Now with vast reserves of natural gas having been discovered, we have the opportunity to secure our energy production and be self reliant whilst also regenerate the North with a new industry.

alcazar

iTrader: (2)

Genuinely worked out, unproductive, or too small ones that had seams that could be reached from elsewhere, NOT coal-producing rich mines like she closed.

What, wrecked our coal industry out of spite? Out of political dogma?
And the steel industry and most of our manufacturing too?

Of course he was, he was an idiot, but she went TOO FAR.

Don't talk like a soft lad, what she did was motivated by spite and political dogma. She genuinely believed that this country could exist just for the service industries and went about wrecking manufacturing wherever she could. Most of the problems we now have with imports, no manufacturing base etc etc are down to her policies, hers alone.

She needed to bring the unions to heel, but went much too far.
What sort of a country do we live in now where the working man cannot withold his labour if a judge says not?

You are mixed up in your thinking...this lot came YEARS later.

of course they should, but they haven't been. What shouldf we now do, wring our hands and sit in the dark, or build some more and stop messing with the ones we have?

Vast reserves of natural gas? where? first I've heard of it?
Unless you mean fracking?
And that's unproven yet...

jonc

The coal industry was already in steep decline decades before Thatcher came into power with coal being produced far more cheaply by other countries, so much so that it was actually cheaper to import coal. The UK coal industry was becoming completely unsustainable and we simply could not continue with subsidising an industry that was incurring huge losses. Unfortunately the same could be said for the other large scale manufacturing industries such as steel and automotive. It's ludicrous to say that this was done simply out of spite. She did not destroy the manufacturing industry, manufacturing output was 7.5% higher when she left office than when she came in.

No one uses coal, especially at the prices that were producing it at, to make it economically viable. We would have no buyers, since EC green lobby meant coal fired powerstations had to be decommissioned. We would be faced with huge cost of closing the mines and what with public expenditure being what it is today it would have ballooned massively compared to what it is today.

Either way, before Thatcher, we were the laughing stock of Europe, we at the bottom of Europe's list of growing economies, we were the poor man of Europe. Thatcher had the vision and foresight to see that the global market and economy was changing and that growth for this country lay not in manufacturing but in the tertiary industry. UK is now the top financial hub of Europe and major player in the global economy, something that this county couldn't have achieved without her or if the status quo was maintained before she came into office. At the end of the day, it's impossible to expect that she could please everyone, it is inevitable that some will lose out as this nation advances, but overall this country saw an acceleration in the standard of living compared to pre-Thatcher era.

alcazar

iTrader: (2)

Aye, right, lets knacker our balance of payments importing coal fetched out of the ground by 13 year old skivvies.

owt for a nice quiet life, eh?

paulr

....and what percentage is the renewables surcharge?

As for foreign ownership. Do you think Chinese investment funds, German investment funds, etc do it for the good of the uk......and even worse, you can't hit them with bad publicity, they don't care. It's all about profit. If the lights went out, who is going to organise a demonstration in Beijing.

Selling of our assets. Another case of short term Britain.

paulr

I'd rather them be British owned and unprofitable, than owned by Chinese hedge funds. It's a matter of pride.

warrenm2

jonc - you are using facts to back up your argument, something that Alcazar doesn't understand. Please be more outspoken, knee jerk and recite left wing mantras such as "its all Thatchers fault, the witch", and "she destroyed manufacturing". Wait I think those have already been used...

There, fixed that for you Alcazar !

warrenm2

And in one sentence you demonstrate the total economic pig ignorance that got us into the mess of the 70s. I'm am truly shocked by just how stupid that remark is. You really should go off and live in the real world instead of this fantasy "I think things should be like this" dream you currently reside.

jonc

Pride? Really? I'm guessing you don't drive a British built car.