I don't see any energy security for the future for the UK unfortunately. We sold ourselves short during the GW/Blair Neo-labour era. Scotland maybe, they have wind-farms but the UK likes to tax that. We've just started the era of paying for the cost of Brexit. It's hitting hard.
My weekly supermarket shop for the basic essentials (cheese, eggs, flour, vegetables) now come to around $60/80 a trip.
Parmesan Cheese is around ~£22-£45 ($30-$60) per kg compared to the US $7–$24+ per kg.
Why not? You've got abundant wind and solar. Once installed, even if for some reason you can't get new turbines or panels, you'll still have a decent amount of capacity.
Solar is hit & miss. The only capacity we really have is wind and those are only efficient to those near the sea or in the highlands. England, Scotland, Wales are governed by rain 80% of the year and with the sun we get, household solar rarely breaks even.
Just because we've got, if the government isn't supporting it's pretty much wasted. The renewable farms we do have are mostly funded by private investments firms. Scotland and Wales wants more renewable but the UK government says no.
mate, I dunno what your smoking, but it deffo does. I'm about 50% "paid off" and I had an expensive setup. Installed now the equivalent costs about 50% of what it did.
> Scotland and Wales wants more renewable but the UK government says no.
National grid say "holy shit I need to build more cables" then local people say "ewwww pylons" and shit gets more expensive. There is a bottleneck between england and scotland, which is partially being solved by https://www.nationalgrid.com/the-great-grid-upgrade
The whole boo england, poor scotland/wales thing gets tired super quick. its being solved, is it being solved fast enough? no, but thats because we have a raised a shit generation of empty politicians from across UK and NI. (and the co-dependent pundit class)
> The renewable farms we do have are mostly funded by private investments firms.
Mostly pension funds. but yes, private. However given the high turnover of (useless) polticians, and a civil service that has had all is expertise hollowed out and replaced by consultancy firms, I don't think public funding, without structural reform is a good idea (look at railways for example)
A quick search says the UK produced 18,314 GWh of solar last year. And this was mostly funded by private investment? It seems like for some infrastructure investment, the government is getting long-term renewable power. If the solar isn't making money, why is it growing 30% annually?
What is stupid about nuclear? It's a huge amount of clean, secure energy.
Would your preference be dependence on Russian/US oil natural gas? Would you feel the same if Russia invaded Finland/Baltics and US took over Greenland?
> What is stupid about nuclear? It's a huge amount of clean, secure energy.
It's not the stupidly of the reactor producing. I don't agree with it personally, but hey whatever, it's a thing. The stupidly of it is that we are small island.
Claim what you wish about how safe they are but like anything: errors and malfunctions. Cyber sabotage and all that.
If an reactor were to implode we're eff'd. We don't have landmass to facilitate the output waste in the UK and the waste we do currently produce has to be shipped elsewhere; sold for dark money.
> Would your preference be dependence on Russian/US oil natural gas? Would you feel the same if Russia invaded Finland/Baltics and US took over Greenland?
My preference would be my hand with a gun pointed at my temple and myself pulling the trigger. To dark?
Forgive me, but I don't think you're looking at UK energy policy with a pragmatic and realistic lens. The UK could always make a reactor safer and more secure. If you're dependent on gas, Russia or the US could just shut off the tap.
even accounting for fukushima/chernoble nuclear is between solar and wind in terms of human deaths. And new units are safer than both. EPR went 'just add one more thing' to be more expensive, AP1000 went passive safety way but westinghose imploded and they needed to ask Korea for help
An accident spreading hazardous substances over a large geographical area that are difficult to contain (or waste of this type) is unique to nuclear power; no renewable energy source poses such a threat.
Another problem is the urgency (due to the impacts) combined with the difficulty of modifying power plants as required by "lessons learned," in other words, bug fixes. Modifying or repairing solar panels or wind turbines is easier than working on a reactor and results in a smaller reduction in the plant's output. The effects of this are significant.
The number of victims (and more generally, the health impacts) of nuclear power depends on the method of analysis, which is controversial. This is true for Chernobyl and Fukushima, where the evacuation triggered by the nuclear accident officially caused 2,202 deaths (2019 count), and 2,313 according to the International Nuclear Association.
Even the maximum potential impact of an accident is debated.
The full impact of nuclear power will at best only be known after all dismantling is complete and the last cold waste is disposed of (before this deadline any mishap or stray waste can be costly), in a few thousand years.
renewables are still made from different substances, one of which is copper. One byproduct of copper is extremely toxic- arsenic, and it's spills are not that different in terms of dangers. That's the point. For nuclear at least, over time decay happens, esp for most dangerous isotopes, but for chemical waste - it's forever.
Nuclear still has higher capacity factor than any VRE.
Evacuation numbers for Fukushima are accounted in the stat. But it's also worth mentioning Japanese govt acknowledged most of the deaths are caused by extreme evacuation measures that werent needed, but govt ignored the data it had to enforce them. The panic against nuclear caused them, not radiation.
If either one of the two alternative government parties of the UK get in they will scrap all. Reform UK sets out plans to tax renewable energy, conservatives are all for the oil.
2030 is four years away & the next election is in 2029. The Labour party is unlikely to get in again, and if they do it'll be a miracle. Far-Right or Fascist Right.
Reform UK won't get enough seats to sit in parliament this election but if in the future, it's a dystopian vision I don't want to think about. Trump-XL, tax the EU, climate change doesn't exist, kick out asylum seekers, higher taxation to further screw Scotland and Wales. Heavily back pocketed by the US oil and tobacco industry, Nigel is foul MAGA of the UK.
Conservatives, sponsored by oil and pharmaceutical. Exxon, Esso, BP et cetera. They got their wish with Brexit, they made a bucket load of cash from that and they're the ones who scrapped the renewable industry in the first place. One of their aims is to scrap the NHS and make it privatised.
Similar to Trump and MAGA, Reform UK's popularity relies on Farage's cult of personality. Without him, they're significantly less of a threat. He's not a young man (not as old as some, but not young), and he smokes and drinks heavily; make of that what you will.
> A supermarket shop for the basic essentials (cheese, eggs, flour, vegetables) now come to around $60/80 a trip.
No it doesn't. Maybe if you are shopping at Waitrose. It is more expensive. But it isn't £45 for basics. I did an entire shop which will last me the week for £30 (in Aldi).
I shop at Sainsburys where I can. The main supermarkets for me are Morrison and kind of forced to use M&S.
Everyone has their super market preference. ASDA would be cheaper still. You can't disagree that prices have sky rocketed, shrunk in quantity and now lower quality.
I am not denying there is inflation and shrinkflation. However I kept my bill in check by doing the bulk of my shopping and cheaper stores e.g. Aldi (quality of most stuff is comparable to more expensive super markets) and only spending more when it makes sense.
The vast majority of the public doesn't understand what causes inflation or that there is a difference between monetary and price inflation and energy is part of that.
I think they are probably buying the most expensive of everything in the shop. I can get everything for about £30-40 in Aldi.
> I mean we really didn't it was a period of great productivity and a massive boost in living standards almost universally.
A huge amount of wealth was also created under Thatcher but also a huge amount of wealth inequality. Blair didn't really change anything initially and continued their policies.
Remember that period ended with the Global Financial Crisis and an large increase of deficit spending.
There is also other problems with the Blair government. There was our involvement in the war in Afghanistan/Iraq, some of the iffy terrorism legislation amongst other things.
