Maybe we are not doomed after all

Pinno wrote:

The building of wind farms in Denmark for another example, rarely meet opposition as most of them are co-operatively owned. In fact, the co-operative ethic was born in Scandinavia. It's also prevalent in the Basque region.

FocusZing wrote:

Try and fight my way through all the political threads and "I am considerably richer than Yews" ones.

An Australian state will install the world's largest lithium ion battery in a "historic" deal with electric car firm Tesla and energy company Neoen.
The battery will protect South Australia from the kind of energy crisis which famously blacked out the state, Premier Jay Weatherill said.
Tesla boss Elon Musk confirmed a much-publicised promise to build it within 100 days, or do it for free.
The 100-megawatt (129 megawatt hour) battery should be ready this year.
"There is certainly some risk, because this will be largest battery installation in the world by a significant margin," Mr Musk said in Adelaide on Friday.
He added that "the next biggest battery in the world is 30 megawatts".

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-australia-40527784

Thats going to be one hell of a lot of individual cells.

nickice wrote:

PBlakeney wrote:

Pinno wrote:

The building of wind farms in Denmark for another example, rarely meet opposition as most of them are co-operatively owned. In fact, the co-operative ethic was born in Scandinavia. It's also prevalent in the Basque region.

Stupid socialists, operating for the common good. How is one to make a profit from that?
Sarcasm, in case it is not obvious.

I believe that one of the main problems with cooperatives is that too much money is taken out of them rather than invested. No system is perfect.

Pinno wrote:

Just like Communications, energy is a national concern. Japan's rail and the new magnetic train cost a fortune to build but is still relatively cheap to travel on as it is heavily subsidised by the government as it is in everyone's interest to have good, reliable, affordable communications.
The building of wind farms in Denmark for another example, rarely meet opposition as most of them are co-operatively owned. In fact, the co-operative ethic was born in Scandinavia. It's also prevalent in the Basque region.

Reducing energy prices in the UK could cut costs to businesses significantly. Doesn't British businesses and industry pay nearly the highest amount per kw in Europe?
How much of Hinckley will be owned by the state?
Why are we relying on the profit makers to have such a huge influence in energy supply?

Our ability to compete on a global scale is hampered by poor communications and very high energy costs. Hinckley will do little to alleviate the latter. If we increase rail use and encourage investment in rail, then it will not benefit the former either.
Cross rail is being delivered at a massive cost but will rely on electricity. We will end up with a Concorde scenario yet again: Too long to build, over budget and under subsidised with the caveat that a minimum price needs to be met to pay off the debts and contributors associated with it. It will ultimately be more expensive than originally anticipated to use.
Would it be correct to say that essential Nationally owned services will never materialise given the political backdrop and our record/the public's perception of Nationalisation or would that be impossible anyway as we are UK PLC and most things are owned by some company, domestic or foreign?

According to official reports, the project's budget is CNY ¥300 million (approx. USD $37 million), some 1/15 to 1/20 the cost of a comparable reactor built in other countries.

TheBigBean wrote:

https://e360.yale.edu/digest/britains-co2-emissions-have-fallen-to-levels-last-seen-in-1890

TheBigBean wrote:

The world hits one terawatt of wind and solar.

https://www.businessgreen.com/bg/news/3 ... -and-solar

The company best known for its vacuums and domestic appliances bought the disused airfield at Hullavington two years ago.
Dyson has already renovated two hangars built in 1938 at the 517-acre site.
That redevelopment has cost £84m and the next phase of the airfield's development would take Dyson's total investment to £200m.
About 400 automotive staff are now based at Hullavington and a further three buildings will open in the coming months, offering an additional 15,000 sq m of testing space.

lostboysaint wrote:

It is quite odd that in five pages no-one has got to the obvious solution for an island. Tidal power is the solution that should have been investigated significantly more than solar or wind because it is absolutely NOT weather dependent. The energy stored in moving water is much higher than other sustainable sources and it's guaranteed as long as the earth keeps spinning.

Yes the infrastructure costs are generally believed to be higher but so are the returns. If the government can subsidise Hinkley then why not subsidise a tidal power station on the same stretch of coastline? Most of it isn't navigable for much of the time so use the flood and ebb tides to create power.

Ecological impact is the biggest concern - but then that's no different to having fields full of panels killing off crops and wind turbines smashing birds to pulp or changing air flows which affect the environment around them (not to mention the bird strikes.

Bizarre that as an island nation that sees all that energy literally washing ashore and then the same energy leaving again twice a day, every day for the whole life of the planet we haven't done anything with it.

Tangled Metal wrote:

IIRC there was a lot of investment in tidal and wave power at UK universities by UK government at one time. There was an especially interesting development off the North Sea coast. UK was a major player in the technology.

As usually the case government short termism kicked in and the politicians kicked the funding into the long grass on favour of the existing and more advanced wind turbine sector of renewable energy. I believe the situation was that wind energy was available to get up and running quickly for less money.