The only way is shale gas - ditch nuclear

jay1181

It just doesnt make sence that we have in Scotland 3/4 coal power plants on extended readyness (mothballed) because the E.U says we cant use them for more than 20 thousand hours or something like that when we have coal to use either abroad or internal in different parts of the uk. These plants because of the eu will have to close by 2014 what a waste of money and resources.

SallyKing

jay1181 wrote: »

These plants because of the eu will have to close by 2014 what a waste of money and resources.

Do they have to close? What are the consequences if we continue to run them?

WhiteHorse

Nuclear fusion is the only way forward.

SallyKing

WhiteHorse wrote: »

Nuclear fusion is the only way forward.

Not a viable solution in the short term unfortunately. Probably still decades or even centuries before we crack that one, if ever.

We need to base our decisions on solutions that we have today, not things that we may have in the future.

The technology to extract shale gas exists today and is proven to work.

larkim

SallyKing wrote: »

I would argue that those who waste heat are already punished with higher bills. When there are so many grants and cheap insulation deals available there is no excuse now for not having a minimum standard of energy efficiency.

I wonder how much the (warmfront?) grants cost us? I understand the cost of those on low incomes getting £thousands of free brand new boilers was loaded onto our bills.

Personally I'm a great believer in using price to change people's behaviour, so to an extent I agree with you.

But if we accept that carbon fuels = bad in principle (and not everyone does), then surely we shouldn't be simply saying "well, its OK - so long as I can afford the ££ of this damaging fuel then that's OK".

Your logic appears to be that so long as carbon based fuels are cheap to extract, then we should continue to use them and to hell with the consequences. I would disagree, and say that we should have a realistic price for fuel which either a) matches the damage it causes or b) allows for investment in technology which mitigates / reduces the impact of the fuel. So, carbon capture / storage investment might be the way to allow carbon fuels to continue to be used. Or alternatively we might just have to accept that generating electricity / heating homes is actually quite expensive.

Matt

WhiteHorse

SallyKing wrote: »

Not a viable solution in the short term unfortunately. Probably still decades or even centuries before we crack that one, if ever. We need to base our decisions on solutions that we have today, not things that we may have in the future.

Hm. I really wonder if it's that unobtainable. Limitless, clean, cheap power would upset in awful lot of applecarts, wouldn't it?

The technology to extract shale gas exists today and is proven to work.

Unfortunately, that's another finite resource with its own drawbacks.

whasup

SallyKing wrote: »

Not a viable solution in the short term unfortunately. Probably still decades or even centuries before we crack that one, if ever.

We need to base our decisions on solutions that we have today, not things that we may have in the future.

The technology to extract shale gas exists today and is proven to work.

Might not be so. Low energy nuclear units are in production right now and a number of working units are due for installation very soon. The buyers are well informed highly qualified people so we'll soon know if it's genuine or not.