Worried about keeping warm

ilikecookies

grahamc2003 wrote: »

While the current dire energy situation - and I doubt most realise how really dire it is - has been made much worse by green imperatives over the last 15/20 years, the rot set in around 50 years ago, and for that 99% of the population are culpable. There was - and still is - only a single source of energy for the substantive part of our electricity, and that is Nuclear. Others are either intermittent (like solar or wind), or finite (like coal, gas). Posting a view like this 20 years ago - as I did - would result in instant condemnation from every quarter as if I were insane (I don't think I am, and I did work at the highest engineering level for the National Grid), but today such posts get reasonable support, with now only a minority thinking we can manage without. It really doesn't matter what the risks are (they are tiny relative to most others), it is the only option on the table (for the substantive part).

Energy policy, such as it is, has been dictated by anti-Nuclear groups with the support of the vast majority in the near past, and ideologically driven 'environmental' (which are anything but these days) groups in the near past, producing our current situation, where in 4 or 5 years time, we'll be lucky to escape electricity rationing, and when we can get it, it will be very expensive. Aiui, there are 4 reasonably large coal fired (i.e. relatively cheap) power stations being decommissioned as I type, and the implied view that they can be replaced by very expensive and highly subsidised windmills and solar power is an obvious nonsense. I wish I could post something more encouraging.

If you are insane then I am too as I wholeheartedly agree with your summation

It is indeed both a very worrying and frustrating situation as the UK seems to be sleepwalking towards the point of no return in terms of it's energy policy. If we think energy is dear now, with such indecision and procrastination, I dread to think what it will be like in 10 years. I assume it will either be prohibitively expensive and/or in very short supply.

I'd have thought keeping the lights on, at a reasonable cost, would be one of the govt's key priorities but it doesn't seem that way. Instead all we seem to hear about is that householders need to insulate better. At the end of the day you can only insulate so much and the laws of physics dictate there will be heat-loss and so energy is needed. Securing this supply at a reasonable and controllable cost would seem like a bit of a priority to me!