2024 UK politics - now with Labour in charge

I would again suggest that the problem is our amazing ability to make any infrastructure or major engineering project take forever and run massively over budget, rather than scary radiation. We are already switching off wind farms because we can't get enough of the electricity down from the Shetlands to somewhere a bit more densely populated. The country is also full of anti-pylon action groups. I'd suggest that is at least as big an issue as the success or failure of a particular technology.

The report that I read is that it's just too tight a schedule to get everything sorted for the billing run later this term, especially as it won't be in law until the budget. Bu they should have thought of that when they announced it, especially since beginning of the school year makes a lot more sense for all sorts of reasons. Smacks of poor foresight in wanting to rush out the policy announcement.

I think we'll be "limping along" with gas as a major factor in our electricity generation for some while yet, albeit without carbon capture to any particular extent, as it hasn't been made to work yet on any great scale. ("Green" requirements will go out of the window as soon as politicians have to make a definite choice between using gas and letting the voters' lights go out.) I think we'll get to an almost gas-free relatively soon, but not to the timescales hoped for by the more optimistic politicians / activists, if only because storage technology still has to develop and there will doubtless be planning delays in respect of building what needs building to link the new offshore wind capacity to the grid.

Far from sanctions, you should actually be charging us for this.

The capacity market ensures that the UK can meet peak demand. It's a choice to let imports bid into that.

Of course energy generation can match the environment. Iceland has thernal and Norway has hydro. Some countries have lots of sun. The UK has lots of wind.

Relying on imports worked really well two years ago when the French weren't exporting, due to unexpected outages in their nuclear power stations.

Obviously, demand can be matched to supply via pricing, but as a nation, we demonstrated two years ago that we don't like the resulting prices. (And we don't like the implications of the borrowing that was required to cap electricity prices.) So it's likely a good idea not to build in reliance on supplies that aren't under our control to any great extent.

Are you suggesting the energy crisis was a result of the French interconnector?

I have a client who works in one of the boarding houses at one of the popular local private schools. She told me today they are cutting back their non-teaching staff to the bone to try to mitigate the impact of the VAT imposition. She said a few are about to lose their jobs, all low / lower paid people.

As with all things that go seriously awry, the issue with sky high electricity prices arose due to multiple factors all biting at the same time. It wasn't just one thing. One could say that government was unlucky, but they're paid to mitigate the impact on voters from "bad luck".

Lack of gas storage in the UK was obviously one other factor. Likewise rapid decommissioning of coal-fired power stations. (Nice headlines about being the first G7 country to be "coal-free" re electricity, but at the cost of leaving very little slack in the system.) The politicians waffle on about energy security, but seem to adopt strategies that are directly opposed to achieving it at times.

Doing what?

i suspect a lot will depend on the planning times. As RJS said that’s where time and cost build up in the UK. We’re OK at actually building stuff providing we can get the materials and labour.

one option is to replace conductors in existing overhead lines, the benefit is a considerable increase in capacity, article says up to 100% is achievable...

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/09/climate/electric-grid-more-power.html?unlocked_article_code=1.Qk4.9abb.OJVXSR3ShhdZ&smid=url-share

presumably equipment each end would need upgrading too, but it's probably upgrade in-place rather than new sites

though nimbys would probably complain that the new cables were sending messages into their subconscious to make them eat foreign cheese

Another option is put them below the sea. Obviously much more expensive and still needs to be taken onshore, but would be quicker. Either way, the government needs to do something.

Good news: Labour's lead over the Tories in the polls has fallen to 1 point and the Tories don't even have a leader.

Although to be fair, it could be said that Labour don't either 😀

Its a sign of things to come that they have fallen so far so quickly in the publics eyes. Even the Guardian has a downer on him 😱