Blackouts by 2014?
Discussion
The other day I was chatting to my dad, when we got on the subject of power, and how all of the tree huggers just wanted to build windmills and were against any realistic method of generating power such as the new clean coal stations or nuclear, when he basically said "they wont be happy until we're sitting in the dark, and those days are coming".
To be honest, I didnt think much of it at the time, I just thought he was exagerrating. But apparently not, for I read in the papers and on the news today that action is needed and quick if we are to avoid facing blackouts and outages by 2014.
Now, is this just typical media scaremongering, or could this actually happen? If so, I think it is absolutely f
king disgusting how st this country is becoming, a supposed developed country that is going to end up sitting in the dark and cold because we cant even generate enough electricity to meet demand.
I'd like to think this wont happen, but knowing this country it probably will
To be honest, I didnt think much of it at the time, I just thought he was exagerrating. But apparently not, for I read in the papers and on the news today that action is needed and quick if we are to avoid facing blackouts and outages by 2014.
Now, is this just typical media scaremongering, or could this actually happen? If so, I think it is absolutely f
king disgusting how st this country is becoming, a supposed developed country that is going to end up sitting in the dark and cold because we cant even generate enough electricity to meet demand.I'd like to think this wont happen, but knowing this country it probably will
All of the nuclear stations are coming towards the end of their intended life (all finished by 2020 IIRC), and that's 15-20% of supply (as well as various other large coal stations) Basically when was the last time a sizeable power plant was built.....? Quite a while ago.
If it gets desperate we can ship it in from abroad, or quite likely would be to see some coal fired stations rushed through, with the promise of CCS in the future to keep tree huggers at bay.
edit - the above poster is correct though, if there's one thing the government can't allow it's the lights going out - so something WILL be done, but it won't be the most sensible/cheapest/greenest by a long way as the politicians will postpone it for as long as possible.
If it gets desperate we can ship it in from abroad, or quite likely would be to see some coal fired stations rushed through, with the promise of CCS in the future to keep tree huggers at bay.
edit - the above poster is correct though, if there's one thing the government can't allow it's the lights going out - so something WILL be done, but it won't be the most sensible/cheapest/greenest by a long way as the politicians will postpone it for as long as possible.
Edited by AlfaFoxtrot on Tuesday 30th September 20:02
pbirkett said:
Burgmeister said:
That will never happen. we will ship leccy over from france if things got close i should imagine. would be fun though.
How does that work then? Build big pylons over the channel?Mikey G said:
pbirkett said:
Burgmeister said:
That will never happen. we will ship leccy over from france if things got close i should imagine. would be fun though.
How does that work then? Build big pylons over the channel?HTH
Of course it can happen, with the way things are going its an odds on probability!
We are a nation of net importers we produce manufacture f'all, just about everything we need including gas & electric is already imported.
This has already happened in the 70's 3 day weeks caused by strikes and such.
The difference then was not due to lack of industrial production but to wage negotiations unions.
But now, we have no industry as such and are in the hands of foreign conglomerates to supply our power needs.
If these foreign companies have there own problems, do you think they will give a flying fck about the UK.
I was at secondary school in the 70's and remember it very well!
Buy shares in candles!!!
We are a nation of net importers we produce manufacture f'all, just about everything we need including gas & electric is already imported.
This has already happened in the 70's 3 day weeks caused by strikes and such.
The difference then was not due to lack of industrial production but to wage negotiations unions.
But now, we have no industry as such and are in the hands of foreign conglomerates to supply our power needs.
If these foreign companies have there own problems, do you think they will give a flying fck about the UK.
I was at secondary school in the 70's and remember it very well!
Buy shares in candles!!!
Edited by 69 coupe on Tuesday 30th September 21:46
Mikey G said:
pbirkett said:
Burgmeister said:
That will never happen. we will ship leccy over from france if things got close i should imagine. would be fun though.
How does that work then? Build big pylons over the channel?The power gap is actually fairly illusory, some of the older Advanced Gas-cooled Reactor plants have had their life extended for 5-10 years beyond there nominal decommissioning date. It should be possible for the more modern AGR plants to have their lives extended.
Your issue is that you can't decide how much longer the plant will be able to run effectively for until 3-5 years before the nominal date of decommissioning (the core and other facilities get inspected). The other issue is that as the plants age they will naturally go off line more often.
Gas fueled plants are quick to build and have short pay back times so they could potentially build more of them in a relatively short time period to plug the gap. The issue where do you get the gas to fuel them from, and also the UK needs to invest in more gas storage to reduce our exposure to gas price spikes.
Wouldn't it have been nice if the UK had invested the oil money in nuclear plants instead of pissing it away in general government expenses...
Your issue is that you can't decide how much longer the plant will be able to run effectively for until 3-5 years before the nominal date of decommissioning (the core and other facilities get inspected). The other issue is that as the plants age they will naturally go off line more often.
Gas fueled plants are quick to build and have short pay back times so they could potentially build more of them in a relatively short time period to plug the gap. The issue where do you get the gas to fuel them from, and also the UK needs to invest in more gas storage to reduce our exposure to gas price spikes.
Wouldn't it have been nice if the UK had invested the oil money in nuclear plants instead of pissing it away in general government expenses...
In South Africa we are already in this situation. Our so called "reserve margin" is so tight that whenever there is an unsheduled shut down of a generating plant the electrical utility company has to introduce what they call load shedding.
But on the positive side the order book of the construction company I work for has almost doubled due to winning the work on two of the new 6 pack coal fired power stations being built down here. These are going to be the largest coal fired units in the world when completed. Also waiting on the award of tender for the 1st new nuclear plant down here in over 25 years. The planning includes 6 new nuclear plant here within the next 25 years.
The negative side is that the price for electricity has gone up about 30% this year as they start recuping the cost of the new builds.
But on the positive side the order book of the construction company I work for has almost doubled due to winning the work on two of the new 6 pack coal fired power stations being built down here. These are going to be the largest coal fired units in the world when completed. Also waiting on the award of tender for the 1st new nuclear plant down here in over 25 years. The planning includes 6 new nuclear plant here within the next 25 years.
The negative side is that the price for electricity has gone up about 30% this year as they start recuping the cost of the new builds.
It's all Maggies fault; selling off the Power Industry to the people who already owned it, creating the dash for gas (and we will be held to ransom by the Russians) and at the same time killing off any future developments in Nuclear Power (too expensive for private power companies). There is no mandate to keep the lights on any more 
130R said:
And we just sold all our Nuclear power stations to the French
France has loads more fission plants proportionally to the UK so they have the expertise to build them and run them, and I gather are already planning to build more of them here even before the buyout so that may not necessarily be a bad thing, unless you are a treehugger. Bruggy said:
It's all Maggies fault; selling off the Power Industry to the people who already owned it, creating the dash for gas (and we will be held to ransom by the Russians) and at the same time killing off any future developments in Nuclear Power (too expensive for private power companies). There is no mandate to keep the lights on any more
Rubbish! This impending power-shortage could have been circumvented by:-- Commissioning replacement nuclear plants at ANY time up to c.5 years ago to replace the outgoing nukes, plus the clearly old-tech coal-fired plants which we are going to need to fire up. IMHO largely Labour who ducked this blatently obvious issue.
- NOT selling off all of our N. Sea gas and oil reserves when the prices were low (both Labour and Tories to blame here).
- Investing properly (rather than just tinkering) in tidal-flow and solar energy generation, which are now fast approaching maturity as realistic options.
Oh...and the nukes ARE still owned by the state, or at least partly-so.
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