British Government Energy Policy

Leave it all until the last minute, then you can fast track it through and brush side all the NIMBYs and nuclear opposers.
Looks like a sound policy to me.

British Government Energy Policy

There is one?

first nuclear power stations prob not up and running till 2020 at the earliest = get ready for some loooooong winters!!!

Buy it in from France.

yes im sure they will happily sell us half of their energy for a pittance

No, but they will for a profit - theyve got 70 nuclear power stations IIRC

france have an energy surplus, most of it generated from low-carbon sources (ie nuclear)

i guess thats what you get for thinking and planning ahead

And having no oil or gas of their own

so our energy policy is buy it off the nice johnny frenchmen!! Nelson would be spinning in his grave!! :^0

or get the nice frenchies to build all our nuclear plants for us

Not much of a policy but it might stop the lights going out.

p.s. france uses massive amounts of fossil fuels in the form of petrol etc

quietgenius 09 Nov 22:57
Not much of a policy but it might stop the lights going out.

it wont

ok I'll buy some candles

good thinking

Sir Denis Eton-Hogg 09 Nov 22:57
p.s. france uses massive amounts of fossil fuels in the form of petrol etc

again from 2007 IEA source

france 369 million tonnes CO2 = approx 5.7 tonnes per person
UK 523 million tonnes = approx 8.5 tonnes per person
germany 798 million tonnes = approx 9.7 tonnes per person

as industrial nations go, france is definitely at the low-carbon end of the spectrum

and having that low-carbon electricity infrastructure also means that the switch to things like electric cars actually makes some sense

whereas obviously, if your electricity infrastructure is still supplied by carbon-based sources, things like electric cars make little sense

if you think that france has the capability to power millions of electric cars/trains/buses etc u are sadly deluded. they would probably need to build another 50 nuc power stations to produce this massive amount of power

of course they would have to expand their infrastructure, i never claimed otherwise

of course, it helps that they are world leaders in an energy technology that the UK is now so desparate for that we've effectively had to hand over ownership to them

well maybe in 15 years time we'll all be swanning about in electric cars powered by a gleaming army of state-of-the-art nuc power stations and everything will be hunky dory. maybe.....

funny Sir Denis, you start the thread criticising lack of forward thinking...

yet you also seem to mock any attempt at it

admit it, you just like a good whinge, dont you

bang to rights :^0

I welcome the belated decision to build more nuclear power stations. It will help to reduce carbon emissions.
However nuclear is not carbon free, probably the whole cycle including mining, waste disposal, construction , decommissioning and employees driving to the plant (they're not generally near rail stations) is 30-40% of that of fossil fuel stations.
Nuclear is only suitable for baseload, so there is a limit to the proportion that is economic to generate from nulcear. Still we are way below that limit so not an issue at present.

with our current energy usage patterns, no form of energy is carbon-free if you look at the entire cycle from manufacturing to decommissioning

Np activity is greenhouse gas free.

No

Energy policy needs standing on its head.

The priority should be efficiency - to some of the poitical dunderheads, it is worth reminding them it is cheaper to turn off a light rather than build a new power station.

The continual stalling to sanction the severn barrage and tidal capture off the Channel Islands is nonsensical.

The conflict of power generators who 'make more money' by selling more of their product should be reversed, through the taxation system. They should make more money by selling less of their product. Instead of the tax payer and energy companies pouring money into the 'useless' and wasteful insulation schemes, that are not monitored, prioritised or costed. It's a shambles.

Power generators could be given the task to reduce our energy consumption. They know the big users and should facilitate projects to reduce their consumption. The stamp duty on property sales could be waived if energy efficiencies had been carried out. As a property comes on the market every 7 years or so the rapid but orderly transition to energy efficiency in the current housing stock would soon pay dividends.

The government's headlong dawdle to more generation is ignoring the 'low hanging fruit' of efficiency.

Our population is ramping up to 70million at a time when our power stations are closing down with nothing to replace them.
Great planning guys.