Bishop Hill Shale will be too late
Oct 8, 2013 Energy: grid ;)
Benedict Brogan sets out the painful truth that any developments on the shale gas front are likely to come too late to prevent a power crisis in the UK. With the energy policies of successive governments disjointed, disconnected, uncoordinated, unthinking and unfeeling we are left with the likelihood of power cuts, brownouts or, more likely in my opinion, price rises on an unimaginable scale.
The National Grid yesterday announced that its reserve supply of domestically produced electricity had dropped to troubling levels, and that only the availability of power from the Continent would prevent blackouts. Long before we might hope to begin banking the shale windfall, the lights will go out.
This is the inevitable consequence of handing over control of a key industry to politicians. It is planning that is the problem, not the solution.
Reader Comments (80)
It may be that the mainstream media are still getting it wrong. This is an interesting read from someone who foresaw this "squeeze" several years ago.
http://www.eureferendum.com/blogview.aspx?blogno=84383
Global production of shale gas (dominantly the US, of course) should steady global gas prices. Gas fired CCGTs are quick and cheap to plan and build, especially since we have several sites vacated by previous coal stations (but can they access the gas grid?). So I can't see why the UK is not exploring this option to keep the lights on?
Not sure turning things over to politicians will have dire consequences per se. We are largely in this position due to Ed Miliband, Chris Huhne and Ed Davey who have blindly believed their environmental friends. All three have opposed nuclear and all fossil fuels (including shale) which is leading us to produce a 3rd World power grid. We are now seeing Ed Miliband proposing solutions (e.g. price freezes) which have been used in the 3rd World and failed!
Even now Ed Davey has his head in the sand completely ignoring (not understanding) the science and believes that he is saving the planet It is unbelievable the absolute rubbish coming out of the DECC indicating a complete acknowledgement of the problem. Ed Davey has for a long time been an anti-nuclear campaigner, so what confidence can we have in getting any new nuclear power stations built under the coalition.
It is going to get a lot worse as many think the solution is to build more wind farms!!!! They do not realise that it is not a solution but part of the disease.
Very nearly, Andrew, but it's a little more complicated.
That's where the politicians have screwed up because if you are prepared to pay over the odds for one form of energy generation it is hardly surprising when EDF et al demand the same sort of price for their other forms of generation.It is the inevitable consequence of handing over control of a key industry to people like Miliband, Huhne and Davey who — if they were genuine experienced politicians with any understanding of what government is for and how it works — would never let people like wee Bryony and her pals from Greenpeace, FoE, and the other eco-fanatic groups within 50 miles of Whitehall.
You could add Cameron to that list, I suppose — the current King of Gesture Politics!
Brogan hit the nail on the head (almost) with
And though much of the blame does lie with politicians, it is specifically those politicians that are currently supposed to be calling the shots, or not calling the shots, or thinking about calling the shots, or perhaps not, or unable to decide whether to ... anyway, you get the picture ... that are the root cause.
As one of the comments to Brogan's piece argued, keep the coal-fired stations running and tell the EU where to stick their directives. Merkel can do it; Cameron could grow a pair and to it as well (and might stand him in better stead when it comes to negotiating with the EU — at least they might believe he's serious!). Trouble is the divorce could be acrimonious, and I don't mean the split with Clegg.
It's worse that that. The aim of Ed Milliband and the Lib-Dems that followed him has been clearly stated to decarbonise the UK at whatever cost. Milliband set up the policy. Huhne and Davey did everything they could both to delay the production of fracked gas and to regulate it so that their beloved windmills remain a viable option in a grotesquely distorted market. Osborne's latest wheeze of using fracked gas tax receipts to underwrite wind power is a win for the ecoloons.
Cronyism is as rampant as the lunatic idealism which form a devils pact aimed at impoverishing the people of the UK and having a profound effect upon living standards, quality of life and the opportunities for employment. The omnishambles of AR5 is causing questions to be asked by opinion-formers who previously were content to go with the flow, but the questioning is too little too late. The likelihood of a cool period lasting several decades has been totally discounted by the Warmists though the signs of that possibility were clear to those prepared to see. It is the people of Britain who will pay the price of their stupidity.
The idea of power input from the continent saving our bacon is pure fantasy. Those power lines have for many years been in use to full capacity. Richard North at EU Referendum has commented in some detail in the recent past about the possibility of "blackouts". He points to the background solution being enacted with some stealth by the Dept of Energy, STOR, whereby some 30GW of backup supply is available from small, industrial generators, to provide a reserve electricity supply, but at a cost, and what a cost. I think, Andrew that you are right. We will avoid blackouts but the cost will be horrific. The only upside is that the world in general will begin at that point to appreciate the impact of the lunacy imposed upon us by duplicitous politicians.
Do I hear the unmistakable sound of iron tyres on cobble stones
Spain’s sunshine toll: Row over proposed solar tax.
"We will be the only country in the world charging for the use of the sun," says Jaume Serrasolses.
"Strange things are happening in Spain. This is one of them."
Mr Serrasolses, the secretary of an association promoting the use of solar energy, SEBA, is referring to the government's proposal for a tax solely on those who generate their own electricity.
They would pay a backup toll for the power from their solar panels, in addition to the access toll paid by everyone who consumes electricity from the conventional grid.
Continue reading the main story
“
Start Quote
Alberto Nadal presenting energy reform in Barcelona
Solar energy is much more expensive than that mass-produced by large utilities”
Alberto Nadal
Energy Secretary
Although the tolls vary, if you pay an access toll of 0.053 euros per kWh, you could face a backup toll of 0.068 euros per kWh.
The new tax would extend the average time it would take for solar panels to pay for themselves from eight to 25 years, according to the solar lobby.
The government says that with increasing "self-consumption", the income for conventional energy systems will decrease, but grid maintenance will cost the same.
"If I produce my own energy, but am connected to the grid, having the backup in case my production fails, I have to contribute to the cost of the entire system," says Energy Secretary Alberto Nadal.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-24272061
@ Jack Savage Oct 8, 2013 at 8:57 AM
EU ref blog: "However, in the event of a very severe winter, there is a 1 in 20 chance of a peak demand of 59.0GW. And, with median wind and zero net interconnector flow, it is possible that posted generation availability could fall to 58.8GW – a potential shortfall, on paper.
However, the contracted winter period STOR is 3.5GW, plus the system frequency response will be brought up to 1.9 GW. Then there are Maximum Generation Contracts in place for Winter 2013/14, providing up to 1GW of extra generation in an emergency – which is not recorded on the declared reserve. We thus have a "hidden reserve" of over 6GW, to cover a worst case scenario"
Not a very satisfying story. There are week-long periods in winter when wind energy is close to zero, that is about 2 GW below median. Such periods cannot be reliably forecast, as is clearly shown on Gridwatch. Also, during such periods STOR will not be much help; the power will run out before the period has ended. The marketing guy says that mothballed plants can be brougth into service, but that will take time, at least a day.
I think the National Grid are a bit too arrogant saying they have everything under control. Murphy's law says that what can go wrong, will go wrong.
Another article in the same paper says Ministers face attack over growing blackout risk.
It is galling that when this danger has been warned of for AT LEAST a decade ,that the government is now waking up to the reality. I blame people such as Chris Huhne for the delay illuminated by Brogan, but not exclusively, since this is a collective disaster caused by the political class. Inevitably "mothballed" power stations will have to be brought into service in defiance of the EU directives on emissions just as the Germans are now doing. One thing is for certain the nascent green energy sector is expensive but largely irrelevant.
You can bet your life that when the UK demand for electricity approaches the supply, the French inter-connector will mysteriously be "unavailable due to technical issues".
We have been led by donkeys into this situation. I recall that there were 13 energy ministers under Nulab, and now 2 LibDem ones, who have deliberately ignored the warning messages provided by professional power engineers.
Like David Coe I am puzzled why National Grid are suggesting that the French and new Dutch connector will keep the lights on the UK. Their combined capacity is only 3GW, and we have been relying on the best part of 2GW 24/7 from France for years already. Thanks to the recent and planned closure of coal and old nuclear plants, in future winter cold spells (when there is no wind or from hydro) the energy gap is going to be at least 5-10GW. People in the industry have known this for years. I blame the senior management of the big six for allowing this situation to develop. The CEOs have buried their heads in the sand and reaped short term profits and subsidies rather than address the large iceberg in front of them. The government's scientific advisers (north and south of the border) have failed also, despite the obvious threat brownouts and blackouts pose to our economy, national security and social order. Few if any politicians understand the basics of how the national grid functions, but the advisers in DECC have no excuse. I am still puzzled why senior military personnel have not convened an urgent meeting with the PM, given the threat to our national security, and the fact that it will very likely be the army that is called on to restore order on the streets when the looting begins.
Have they demolished those closed coal plants yet - time to turn them back on ?
Coal is cheaper now too.
The writing was on the wall when Tony bLiar signed up to the EU Directive to produce 15% of our energy (not electricity as was thought possible) from renewable sources. This error was compounded by agreeing to the Large Combustion Plant Directive which meant the inevitable closure of the coal-fired power stations whoch produce cheap electricity and no new ones unless they were fitted with the non-existent carbon sequestration technology. Margaret Beckett said "over my dead body" to nuclear power development and then, just when there was a chance of nuclear development, Gordon Broon sold off Westinghouse to Toshiba for a song. Nobody will now build gas-fired power stations unless they are hugely compensated for not operating them when the wind blows. We are truly stuffed.
14 years of being led by self-serving idiots has destoyed what took over 200
hundred years of work by scientists and engineers to achieve via the industrial revolution. A 4th world economy and society is just around the corner.
"We're all doomed I tell you".
The interconnectors only work if there is a surplus being generated, this has been typically provided by French Nuclear, however now the Germans need the same surplus to cover up their shutdown of their Nuclear. That surplus will be put up for auction so prices will spiral out of control and some one will end up with no power.
And fracked gas surpluses in the US are not available for export until the port terminals are in place.
Rock and hard place but easily predictable years ago.
But the green meanies will love it, they want expensive and restricted energy and they are going to get it.
I have long been of the view that, whatever the climate 'scientists' or the IPCC come up with and however many cracks there are in the 'consensus' view, cAGW will only be finally put to bed when all the politicians that have so enthusiastically nailed their colours to the greenie mast have retired or died. Or, if the people of this country start to have to shiver in the dark. That's when things will get interesting.
Morph: It's not easy to return moth-balled plant to service. They have to be refurbished, fuel stocks rebuilt and where are the skilled operators - have they been sitting twiddling their fingers on full salary?
Capell on Oct 8, 2013 at 9:00 AM
"So I can't see why the UK is not exploring this option to keep the lights on?"
Why should they? They want to decarbonise the country, as part of the deindustrialisation of Britain.
And we vote in the LibLAbCon party, with Ed Miliband, Chris Huhne and Ed Davey as top Energy bod, in every time!
The current government and the industry will get the blame - Milliband er all will be unmarked. The BBC and the rest if the establishment will see to that. I just cannot work out what this government is doing. It is neither working in the national interest or screwing the opposition - it is screwing itself and the country. Inexplicable.
Re: Oct 8, 2013 at 9:00 AM | ConfusedPhoton
"We are largely in this position due to Ed Miliband, Chris Huhne and Ed Davey who have blindly believed their environmental friends."
Oh, I don't think our politicians are stupid - simply ambitious. They are following the policies of the UN with total disregard for their effect on the people of the UK. They are 'world' politicians now, ditto Salmond in Scotland, Julia Gillard ex of Australia and Obama in the US, identical policies to the detriment of their respective populations.
The UN with Agenda 21 has much to answer for
"By the same measure, the evaluation of the IPCC output is not a scientific task – it is essentially political, exploring the reasons why politics is masquerading as science. But the moment the scientific credentials are accepted, the battle is lost – it is being fought on the ground dictated by the enemy.
The only thing, therefore, one needs to say of this AR5 is that it is a political statement by a politically motivated body, made for political reasons. And if you need to know the basis of the politics, start with Rio in 1992 and Agenda 21."
http://www.eureferendum.com/blogview.aspx?blogno=84359
Re: Albert Stienstra
> There are week-long periods in winter when wind energy is close to zero, that is about 2 GW below median. Such periods cannot be reliably forecast,
They can't be reliably forecast but they can be predicted. The week long periods of near zero wind energy usually occur at the coldest time of the winter and therefore when the demand is highest. This is because the UK experiences its coldest period when you get a high pressure system that sits over the UK without moving.
Let's face it, to fail to provide adequate power and energy for the nation to function is a treasonable failure. resignations are the least of it; people should be in the dock to face charges of reckless endangerment of the nation.
All from the CC Act and fanatical greenism, too. Quite, quite insane.
Re: Oct 8, 2013 at 10:17 AM | Cheshirered
"Let's face it, to fail to provide adequate power and energy for the nation to function is a treasonable failure."
Interesting to note that one of the first acts of the Blair government was to get rid of the death penalty for Treason!!
lapogus on Oct 8, 2013 at 9:36 AM
"I blame the senior management of the big six for allowing this situation to develop. The CEOs have buried their heads in the sand and reaped short term profits and subsidies rather than address the large iceberg in front of them. The government's scientific advisers (north and south of the border) have failed also ... Few if any politicians understand the basics of how the national grid functions, but the advisers in DECC have no excuse. I am still puzzled why senior military personnel have not convened an urgent meeting with the PM, given the threat to our national security ..."
Don't you think that someone with the job title of "Secretary of State for Energy" should be responsible for ensuring that Britain has a credible energy policy; an energy policy that will ensure the rest of Britain can function: industry, transportation, hospitals, care homes and domestic lighting and heating?
If the Secretary of State for Energy has no plan, no policy for this objective, no direction, why should anyone else do it for him?
In fact, how can anyone else do it for him? His/her advisors can only aid, support and give advice(!); they cannot initiate direction. That is for the Minister to do! The Army cannot take it upon themselves to do anything without the say so of the Government; otherwise, that would be a coup! Why do you think that the Army would have experts in national energy policy? I am sure they can see the problems, as we all do, including backbenchers, but if the Government has contrary policies, it just carries on, like it has for years!
The energy companies can build power generation capacity, but without any support or direction, and with competitive energy sources being subsidised and our conventional fuels denigrated, would you want to invest in the industry, with several large sectors out of fashion and the rest just moronically unsustainable?
Wiki: mo·ron - Psychology A person of mild mental retardation having a mental age of from 7 to 12 years and generally having communication and social skills enabling some degree of academic or vocational education. The term belongs to a classification system no longer in use and is now considered offensive.
But not as offensive as our current energy policy!
While we may not have blackouts, we will still be paying a lot more than we needed to, and that is if we can afford it.
There must surely be some basis for some sort of corporate manslaughter charges against against the likes of Greenpeace and Scum of the Earth?
Ecofascists have always wanted fuel to be made more expensive, with the implication being that some people will have to use less. If those people include the old, poor, weak, and sick, then a lot of them are going to die in consequence. Ergo, ecofascism kills people. Why is it legal?
Power cuts concentrate minds. In the Pakistani elections this year, promising a dependable electricity supply was one of the crucial campaigning issues, and I think this would be the case in the UK too, were we in a similar mess:
http://beta.dawn.com/news/1016889/it-will-take-years-to-end-load-shedding-khawaja-asif
Some of the the comments are worth reading as well. Could this be a glimpse of our future?
My power bills for the last quarter are about the lowest I can recall this century, due mainly I suspect, to prolonged warm weather and lower consumption. If the same is true for everyone else, then it's been concealing the potential energy shortage situation, perhaps fortunately for the government.
While I'm an enthusiastic supporter of drilling and shale gas/oil development (as it should be known - give us a break from this "fracking" nonsense, please!), I never bought the boosters' notion that it will lead to a drop in gas prices. It will mean "cheaper" energy though - that is, cheaper that what it would inevitably be without the extra gas supplies in the mix.
Things move at such a glacial pace in the UK though. All that fuss over one dinky rig doing one well in Sussex. The USA has 210 drilling rigs and 7,000 producing wells - in North Dakota *alone* !
A series of rolling power cuts in inner cities is needed to bring the politicians to heel. Thus a recent modelling study by the German Grid oversight body concluded that a 4 day outage from the failure of a main EHT transformer due to windmills overloading it would lead to 200,000 deaths.
South Africa tried to do without winter inner city electrical power over a decade ago. The mass criminality and the need for local martial law caused their political lunatics to address the situation properly. Do you remember how quickly BBC luvvies reacted when gangs of feral youths robbed the customers of fancy Notting Hill restaurants?
Bring on the power cuts so we can corral our loonies......
Miliband E, Huhne, Davey, Cameron, Lucas........
AlecM:
It is likely that when rolling power cuts come they will be restricted to rural areas, so that the chattering classes and BBC luvvies won't have their meals interrupted by civil unrest.
Philip
You can't offset 5 GW in rural areas. This is the likely shortage at peak winter demand with a major plant failure on top.
You need to close down a city the size of Sheffield. The local thieves will control the streets within an hour.
Robert Christopher -
Yes, off course the Energy Ministers and Prime and First Ministers are ultimately responsible, but the role that the energy company bosses and the advisers in DECC have played in this car crash of an energy policy should not be forgotten. At a local hustings meeting prior the last Scottish election I asked the candidates if they would resign the morning after the first blackout. For the record John Swinney (and the LibDem whose name escapes me) refused to answer the question. To his credit, Murdo Fraser said he would resign - if he was Energy Minister. But irrc they all went on to say renewables were an essential part of the energy mix, lest they offended any greens in the audience.
Extremely cold weather, electricity cuts so gas central heating won't work. How many extra deaths from hypothermia are acceptable to this pathetic rabble of politicians? Significant jail sentences should be at the end of the line if such a scenario arises. Talk about mending the roof while the sun shines, this lot will be seen to have been removing the walls to mend he roof.
The heart of the problem is that the department is called the Department for Energy and Climate Change. When Brown and Ed Miliband created a department with an irreconcilable conflict in its title, an energy crisis became predictable and inevitable. When in opposition, Cameron thought that the route to power lay in posing as green, and then found himself in bed with people like Clegg, Huhne and Davey who actually believed all the nonsense about saving the world.
Osborne must insist that the department be renamed Department of Energy (they could roll in industrial infrastructure as a whole) and dump all subsidies to unreliable sources of energy and all specific taxes on reliable ones.
How many extra deaths from hypothermia are acceptable to this pathetic rabble of politicians?
A very high number/, I'd guess. Remember, this will be presented as sceptics' fault. If it hadn't been for sceptics objecting to ecofascism we'd have all the windmills we need, you see.
Quite a lot of ecofascists genuinely want to kill us and honestly believe the world would be better if most other people were dead.
Remember here that they have the manual for how to manage the rolling blackouts - here are the links to the Government's Electricity Supply Emergency Code:
http://www.berr.gov.uk/files/file35360.pdf
http://www.berr.gov.uk/files/file30310.pdf
source page: http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/+/http://www.berr.gov.uk/energy/reliability/downstream/page30313.html
As this is apposite, here's a breakdown of the impending coal station closures (due to the EU's Large Combustion Plant Directive), by Brownedoff in Feb 2013:
Here is the expert's view of the criminality of our lunatic politicians: http://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=3&ved=0CDgQFjAC&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.theiet.org%2Fevents%2Flecture-histories%2Fpresidents-address%2F2010-burton-papers.cfm&ei=NtpTUuqJE_SM0wWr0oDoDw&usg=AFQjCNEgcZxMrROil0CzMTNePj0OMC-SZg&bvm=bv.53537100,d.d2k&cad=rja
"This is the inevitable consequence of handing over control of a key industry to politicians."
It's not just handing it over to politicians that is the problem. It's that politicians are so easily controlled by extremist lobbying organisations and groups. Politicians have too much power and so it naturally attracts those who want to control it. So the unions and big business controls Labour and big business controls the Tories. And both are swayed by green organisations that whip up a media frenzy over nothing but who make it out that the world will come to an end unless their policies are implemented - and the weak politicians bend over backwards to accommodate them. Remove the power from politicians by cutting their numbers and you will have a less of a problem.
In March 2013 I was involved in a couple of discussions at the New Left Project where I raised this very question. I had a brief but unsatisfactory conversation with a contributor Leedsjohn1. Who avoided addressing this issue.
More interestingly I received a private email from one of the NLP group which claimed that the National Grid would have no problem coping with winter conditions "because it always has". Unfortunately such crass stupidity annoyed me so much that I deleted the email in question. I'd like to be able to send a "see told you" email.
You can see some of the stuff here:
NLP No Dash For Gas
Which is most important, Duty of Care or Political ideology? Such narrow margins on winter power supply don't demonstrate a fulfilling of Duty of Care. Whether it's power cuts due to union action like in the 70's or a failure by government to ensure a basic energy supply in very cold weather, the result is the same, a threat to life and limb, through the actions of powerful people with a clear disregard for some basic needs, in pursuit of a political ideology. Pathetic, pathetic, pathetic.
If there are power shortages, it will be industry & commerce which will bear the brunt. Forcible interruptions.
Key emotive premises such as hospitals (despite their own on-site diesel generation) allowed to keep their lights on.
All those Maximum-Demand (smart) meters reporting each premises 1/2-hourly consumption in real time.
All those towns with 'green' trams, gridlocked.
I am sure we will 'muddle through', but the muddling through itself will provide hours of entertainment. If the lights do go off that is such an epic fail that the political elite hahaha is doomed. It would be a concrete example of social democracy's inability to withstand unbenign circumstances, that it is essentially a ponzi scheme, and people who are fit to run a ponzi scheme are thus plainly revealed as not fit to run a country when the s hits the f. Since self-preservation (and self-enrichment) is the name of the game, I cannot really see it happening. Somehow, they will save their own necks. But their squirming, lying and blame shifting in the process will be a joy to watch.
This warning from the National Grid gained traction last evening on TV with Sky running it as top story from 11pm. This morning however it has disappeared completely from the radar.
A long cold winter with brownouts, even one, together with rocketing fuel bills, the largest of which arriving in April/May 2014 will concentrate the minds of a populace bristling with anger at the hubristic and venal Lib/Con/Lab pact that led them into the darkness.
That will be the moment for UKIP and Nigel Farage to make such advances in the EU elections that the lightweight posturing parliamentary popinjays are also brought face to face with a bleak reality.
Rather depressingly some of our MPs are still determined to ignore the problem of keeping the lights on. In the Western Mail (the main Welsh newspaper) today there is an article that illustrates the problem.
MPs unite against plan to dilute climate targets
http://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/mpsunite-against-plan-dilute-climate-6152839
Gower Labour MP Martin Caton and Islwyn Labour MP Chris Evans have joined colleagues on the environmental audit committee to call on the UK Government not to ditch Britain’s long-term climate change targets.
They also want the Government to set a 2030 decarbonisation target for the power sector “now” – rather than in 2016 as the Energy Bill sets out.
Next year, the Government will review its plans and the committee are adamant climate change remains a real threat to be countered.
The MPs investigated whether carbon emissions targets should be relaxed. However, it concluded the UK’s existing plans represented the “minimum level of emissions reduction required to avoid a global two degrees temperature rise”.
When will our MPs realise that if the lights start to go out we will hold them responsible? In fact they should be held to account in a court of law - with Ed Miliband, architect of the Climate Change Act, one of the first in the dock.
This is an example of what was known in the 70's as "picking winners".
Germany are building 19 new coal fired power stations, Holland are completing 3 more. The European Directive on large plant emissions does not stop you building new clean modern coal stations. Germany still relies for nearly 60% of its energy on coal despite all the green hype. It is just Britain that has gone mad by imposing a carbon floor tax that essentially bans any new coal stations and made DRAX convert to burning wood chips which is bonkers. The first action the government should take to ensure the lights stay on is to abolish the carbon floor price designed to penalize the market price of coal.
Re: Oct 8, 2013 at 11:42 AM | Joe Public
"All those towns with 'green' trams, gridlocked"
Oh, not just towns and not just trams - see this, the Scottish Government relentlessly pursuing their UN Agenda 21 commitments -
"Almost complete decarbonisation of road transport by 2050 with significant progress by 2030 through wholesale adoption of electric cars and vans, and significant decarbonisation of rail by 2050."
http://www.transportscotland.gov.uk/road/sustainability/Transport-and-Climate-Change
They're already rolling out SPACE (Scottish Planning Assessment of Carbon Emissions) to help them adopt their aims which include -
• a largely carbon-free electricity generation sector by 2030, exploiting Scotland's vast potential in renewable energy complemented by fossil fuels with carbon capture and storage
• largely carbon-free heating for buildings by 2050, through reduced demand, energy efficiency, and renewable and low carbon heating
• almost complete decarbonisation of road transport by 2050, with significant progress by 2030, through wholesale adoption of electric cars and vans
• a comprehensive approach to carbon in rural land use
And this despite the problems we've already had -
http://omnologos.com/climate-change-minister-resigns-because-of-the-extremities-of-the-climate/
""We face a systemic industrial massacre," said Antonio Tajani, the European industry commissioner.
"Mr Tajani warned that Europe's quixotic dash for renewables was pushing electricity costs to untenable levels, leaving Europe struggling to compete as America's shale revolution cuts US natural gas prices by 80pc."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financialcrisis/10295045/Brussels-fears-European-industrial-massacre-sparked-by-energy-costs.html
Consumers may also face an economic massacre.
"I am sure we will 'muddle through"
What faith! Even if Cameron with all his gravitas, tight top lip and concerned frown, were to appear on TV to assure us that all will be well, I wouldn't believe a word of it. I wouldn't believe he had a clue of whether what he was saying was correct or not. All I'd know is that there would be massive reserves of snake oil available when needed.
"When the looting begins"
"The local thieves will control the streets within an hour."
We have a small generator - sufficient to power the gas central heating, a TV and some lights. Also a selection of portable batteries, lights and inverters. I also have a vehicle with 2 batteries and an inverter. But that terrible CH4 "documentary" recently has got me worried. One of the families featured had a genny, but the noise quickly attracted the local hoods, and it was promptly stolen. It seems you either suffer in the cold/dark, or make provisions and run the risk of revenge attacks. There's the further problem of obtaining and storing (at least legally) a supply of fuel.