Energy rationing

[Deleted User]

Pray that we do not have a Winter similar to that of 1962/63 - and that happened before global warming was ever mentioned.

‘The winter of 1962-63 was the coldest snap of weather in the UK since 1740. 

The Met Office recorded temperatures plummeting as low as minus 20 degrees, with blizzards, snowdrifts, and lakes and rivers freezing over.

The Big Freeze, as it came to be known, began on Boxing Day 1962 with heavy snowfall and went on for nearly three months.

Drifts reached up to 20 feet in places and the whole of the country was caught in its icy grip. Off the coast of Kent, the sea froze for up to a mile from shore as temperatures reached record lows.

Homes across the UK saw ice on the insides of their windows and rubbish building up in the streets as collections became impossible. Power cuts were commonplace and even the dead couldn’t be buried as the ground was too solid.

Everyday living became a struggle with rising food prices, crippled public transport, and families having to collect water in buckets from road tankers as mains were frozen.’

I recall going to school in Norfolk and snow drifts were over 10 feet high.

ariarnia

Section62 said:

70sbudgie said:

FreeBear said:

Total, just shy of 2.8GW - Not too shabby, but no where near enough to take up the slack if there is a major failure elsewhere.

4 plants with more than 1/3 of the capacity of the 5 nuclear sites. And perhaps a quarter of the build time for new. 

Dinorwig took about 10 years to build.

Building additional pumped storage or building additional nuclear would be on a similar timescale.

And as SparkyGrad has pointed out, one doesn't fully substitute for the other as they do different things.

aren't the rolls royce plants supposed to only take 3 or 4 once approved? not a solution for this winter but multiple mini plants might be a (relatively) quick fix. 

brewerdave

[Deleted User] said:

Pray that we do not have a Winter similar to that of 1962/63 - and that happened before global warming was ever mentioned.

‘The winter of 1962-63 was the coldest snap of weather in the UK since 1740. 

The Met Office recorded temperatures plummeting as low as minus 20 degrees, with blizzards, snowdrifts, and lakes and rivers freezing over.

The Big Freeze, as it came to be known, began on Boxing Day 1962 with heavy snowfall and went on for nearly three months.

Yup - I can remember that Winter - the snow never thawed - just became blacker and blacker on the pavements and paths. The Grand Union Canal in West London almost froze solid. The bus services became ultra unreliable as they couldn't get them started after overnight shutdowns - I regularly had to walk the 4 or 5 miles to school. 

TheBanker

brewerdave said:

[Deleted User] said:

Pray that we do not have a Winter similar to that of 1962/63 - and that happened before global warming was ever mentioned.

‘The winter of 1962-63 was the coldest snap of weather in the UK since 1740. 

The Met Office recorded temperatures plummeting as low as minus 20 degrees, with blizzards, snowdrifts, and lakes and rivers freezing over.

The Big Freeze, as it came to be known, began on Boxing Day 1962 with heavy snowfall and went on for nearly three months.

Yup - I can remember that Winter - the snow never thawed - just became blacker and blacker on the pavements and paths. The Grand Union Canal in West London almost froze solid. The bus services became ultra unreliable as they couldn't get them started after overnight shutdowns - I regularly had to walk the 4 or 5 miles to school. 

I get the feeling they were made of stronger stuff in those days! If we had a similar situation now, I think it would feel very much like the early days of Lockdown. One would hope there would be enough community spirit to try to look after vulnerable neighbours given the official services would not be able to cope. I imagine the armed forces would have a role to play too. 

But let's hope we don't see a repeat of 1662-3 as I would not like to find out how people or government would react.

facade

[Deleted User] said:

Pray that we do not have a Winter similar to that of 1962/63 - and that happened before global warming was ever mentioned.

‘The winter of 1962-63 was the coldest snap of weather in the UK since 1740. 

The Met Office recorded temperatures plummeting as low as minus 20 degrees, with blizzards, snowdrifts, and lakes and rivers freezing over.

The Big Freeze, as it came to be known, began on Boxing Day 1962 with heavy snowfall and went on for nearly three months.

Drifts reached up to 20 feet in places and the whole of the country was caught in its icy grip. Off the coast of Kent, the sea froze for up to a mile from shore as temperatures reached record lows.

Homes across the UK saw ice on the insides of their windows and rubbish building up in the streets as collections became impossible. Power cuts were commonplace and even the dead couldn’t be buried as the ground was too solid.

Everyday living became a struggle with rising food prices, crippled public transport, and families having to collect water in buckets from road tankers as mains were frozen.’

I recall going to school in Norfolk and snow drifts were over 10 feet high.

My late father was always going on about the Winter of 1947, when the snow was higher than double decker buses and the Italian prisoners of War (that we claimed we hadn't got any transport available for sending them home when really we were using them as a labour force) dug tunnels through the snow.

I used to nod sagely until I saw photographs!

I managed to live through the Winter of 1962/63 without noticing, although I suspect hundreds didn't.

brewerdave

TheBanker said:

brewerdave said:

[Deleted User] said:

Pray that we do not have a Winter similar to that of 1962/63 - and that happened before global warming was ever mentioned.

‘The winter of 1962-63 was the coldest snap of weather in the UK since 1740. 

The Met Office recorded temperatures plummeting as low as minus 20 degrees, with blizzards, snowdrifts, and lakes and rivers freezing over.

The Big Freeze, as it came to be known, began on Boxing Day 1962 with heavy snowfall and went on for nearly three months.

Yup - I can remember that Winter - the snow never thawed - just became blacker and blacker on the pavements and paths. The Grand Union Canal in West London almost froze solid. The bus services became ultra unreliable as they couldn't get them started after overnight shutdowns - I regularly had to walk the 4 or 5 miles to school. 

I get the feeling they were made of stronger stuff in those days! If we had a similar situation now, I think it would feel very much like the early days of Lockdown. One would hope there would be enough community spirit to try to look after vulnerable neighbours given the official services would not be able to cope. I imagine the armed forces would have a role to play too. 

But let's hope we don't see a repeat of 1662-3 as I would not like to find out how people or government would react.

It was what we were used to then .As others have said - no central heating , extra blankets on the bed ,get dressed VERY fast in the mornings and scrape the ice off the windows, usually two jumpers and get the coal in from the bunker to light the fire - TV services only in the late afternoon and evening, so put the BBC Light programme on the radio.
Re "vulnerable" neighbours - we still had delivery services to the door , grocer, greengrocer, baker ,butcher, milkman, paraffin & coal etc so no-one had to go out for food or fuel . Good job because the ice on the pavements caused more than a few accidents that Winter.
Honestly can't remember any power cuts during that time tho'. Were there any ??

macman

ariarnia said:

Section62 said:

70sbudgie said:

FreeBear said:

Total, just shy of 2.8GW - Not too shabby, but no where near enough to take up the slack if there is a major failure elsewhere.

4 plants with more than 1/3 of the capacity of the 5 nuclear sites. And perhaps a quarter of the build time for new. 

Dinorwig took about 10 years to build.

Building additional pumped storage or building additional nuclear would be on a similar timescale.

And as SparkyGrad has pointed out, one doesn't fully substitute for the other as they do different things.

aren't the rolls royce plants supposed to only take 3 or 4 once approved? not a solution for this winter but multiple mini plants might be a (relatively) quick fix. 

The consortium developing them said two years ago that the first one could be operational 'in 10 years', so that's 2030. Then two more a year after that. And when was the last time one of these projects ran to schedule?

FreeBear

Section62 said:

70sbudgie said:

FreeBear said:

Total, just shy of 2.8GW - Not too shabby, but no where near enough to take up the slack if there is a major failure elsewhere.

4 plants with more than 1/3 of the capacity of the 5 nuclear sites. And perhaps a quarter of the build time for new. 

Dinorwig took about 10 years to build.

Building additional pumped storage or building additional nuclear would be on a similar timescale.

And as SparkyGrad has pointed out, one doesn't fully substitute for the other as they do different things.

But 70sbudgie and myself were not claiming that pumped storage is a substitute for nuclear. Just an alternative to battery to cover short periods when the sun doesn't shine or there is no wind. At best, PS is only good for 24 hours at maximum output (maybe not even that). Efficiency isn't that great either at 60-80%, but at least the plants don't go up in flames like the Tesla facility in Australia did last year - https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-07-30/tesla-battery-fire-moorabool-geelong/100337488

Chrysalis

Residential are considered higher priority than industrial so home users its unlikely.
Absolute highest priority I assume is emergency services but I dont think it would ever get close to that point.

The only potential rationing I think would be business users and non emergency public buildings.

badmemory

Just to put the opposite side to that nightmare winter, there was the May bank holiday.  The only time in my life when I have ever got sunburnt.  If I'm honest I don't think I have really been warm since.