David the US has an energy emergency with all its resources then I would politely suggest the title should be
The Great British Energy Catastrophe
because this is what it is and it doesn't have to be like this. Personally I was happy to see offshore wind and solar on buildings over car parks etc combined with efficient CCGT and nuclear as a way to reduce, not eliminate, our emissions. We had the means to do this in a constructive way over 10-15yr horizon and probably could have built a broad political consensus to deliver it along with UK so called green jobs as well exploiting our existing industrial capabilities in O&G. With Milibrain though we have a deranged Bond villain whose only interested in himself and getting a global job better than his brother. There maybe murmuring in the ranks of the Labour party but i just don't see Starmer doing anything about it as Labour is fragile and he wants to hold it altogether and not get the label your just as bad as the others.
So down we sink slowly into the abyss to an unrecoverable position.
Thank you David! To say that energy IS the economy is but a small exaggeration, though I confess that it's only in the last few years that I've twigged this by reading and thinking. I guess that it still eludes not only the electorate, but the UK's governing class, who would proudly display your last two figures as evidence of the UK's climate leadership. Sad to say, only blackouts will shift things.
As an aside, while we know that energy use per capita is the most meaningful measure of a nation's demand, I wonder if it will be used by those with an agenda to infer that rather than demand declining with the stalling economy, savings have been made by individuals, showing that "demand response" has a key role to play.
We are way off blackouts aside from a severe weather event. NESOs control engineers have all the tools to manage the grid and are adept to the emerging situation in creating solutions albeit expensive but the one resource thats unlimited is how much money they can chuck at it. Thus i just don't see the electorate waking up to what is happening anytime soon to stop or even check Milibrains madness.
Well, I'm not entirely convinced about the need for a huge expansion of homegrown artificial intelligence and the vast amounts of energy it will consume, but it's definitely the case that homegrown genuine stupidity is putting the UK at serious risk of economic and social collapse. And I'm not convinced it is JUST stupidity either and neither, amazingly, is the Torygraph. Tin foil hat conspiracy theories about Net Zero have now gone mainstream:
"The furore has laid bare how dangerously exposed we are to energy imports – and exacerbates the urgent need for Britain to become energy self-sufficient – not least when our gas and electricity prices are among the highest in the world. Yet despite fracking leading to an energy (and economic) boom in the US, the energy firm Cuadrilla has announced it will soon start work on plugging the UK’s only two shale gas wells in Blackpool. And on Friday, we learned that more than 10 per cent of farmland in England is set to be diverted towards helping to achieve net zero and protecting wildlife by 2050. The decarbonisation project – which will see swathes of the countryside switched to solar farms – will inevitably put food security and our already fragile farming industry at risk but still the Miliband-led madness continues.
We’ve long feared net zero was a Trojan Horse for the destruction of our capitalist economy. In Labour’s hands, it’s well under way. And should we even get started on immigration? The latest projection from the Office for National Statistics suggests our population will grow to 72.5 million by 2032 – putting yet more strain on our creaking infrastructure. Yet have we heard anything substantive from Home Secretary Yvette Cooper about this? No.
Make no mistake, the Prime Minister and his cabinet pose a Keir and present danger to Britain."
Reports are coming in that Ed Millibrain is proposing that the government buy vast swathes of the Yorkshire Dales to establish massive hamster farms. We'd only need about 124 billion billion hamsters powering hamster wheels to meet the energy requirements specified by NESO for new data centres.
Most of Northumbria has been earmarked for bug production in order to feed the hamsters (and maybe us). The only slight problem is that they still haven't figured out how to limit the potential damage to the climate caused by hamster farts.
Agree with all your recommendations but when will British public wake up? They voted in Labor and tolerated the Tories so don't hold your breath.
Stargate is farce dreamt up by Billionaires (close to Trump but Musk sees through the project?). We conservatives can only hope he can convince the Boss Man T.
Would somebody pass grandfathers' old service revolver, to the Government and guide them round the back of the stables, where they can put us out of our misery by.... you can guess the rest.
Agree with all, but we shouldn't try to mimick the mindless Stargate project. Deepseek demonstrates that clever software works better than monopolistic hardware.
David the US has an energy emergency with all its resources then I would politely suggest the title should be
The Great British Energy Catastrophe
because this is what it is and it doesn't have to be like this. Personally I was happy to see offshore wind and solar on buildings over car parks etc combined with efficient CCGT and nuclear as a way to reduce, not eliminate, our emissions. We had the means to do this in a constructive way over 10-15yr horizon and probably could have built a broad political consensus to deliver it along with UK so called green jobs as well exploiting our existing industrial capabilities in O&G. With Milibrain though we have a deranged Bond villain whose only interested in himself and getting a global job better than his brother. There maybe murmuring in the ranks of the Labour party but i just don't see Starmer doing anything about it as Labour is fragile and he wants to hold it altogether and not get the label your just as bad as the others.
So down we sink slowly into the abyss to an unrecoverable position.
Thank you David! To say that energy IS the economy is but a small exaggeration, though I confess that it's only in the last few years that I've twigged this by reading and thinking. I guess that it still eludes not only the electorate, but the UK's governing class, who would proudly display your last two figures as evidence of the UK's climate leadership. Sad to say, only blackouts will shift things.
As an aside, while we know that energy use per capita is the most meaningful measure of a nation's demand, I wonder if it will be used by those with an agenda to infer that rather than demand declining with the stalling economy, savings have been made by individuals, showing that "demand response" has a key role to play.
We are way off blackouts aside from a severe weather event. NESOs control engineers have all the tools to manage the grid and are adept to the emerging situation in creating solutions albeit expensive but the one resource thats unlimited is how much money they can chuck at it. Thus i just don't see the electorate waking up to what is happening anytime soon to stop or even check Milibrains madness.
Well, I'm not entirely convinced about the need for a huge expansion of homegrown artificial intelligence and the vast amounts of energy it will consume, but it's definitely the case that homegrown genuine stupidity is putting the UK at serious risk of economic and social collapse. And I'm not convinced it is JUST stupidity either and neither, amazingly, is the Torygraph. Tin foil hat conspiracy theories about Net Zero have now gone mainstream:
"The furore has laid bare how dangerously exposed we are to energy imports – and exacerbates the urgent need for Britain to become energy self-sufficient – not least when our gas and electricity prices are among the highest in the world. Yet despite fracking leading to an energy (and economic) boom in the US, the energy firm Cuadrilla has announced it will soon start work on plugging the UK’s only two shale gas wells in Blackpool. And on Friday, we learned that more than 10 per cent of farmland in England is set to be diverted towards helping to achieve net zero and protecting wildlife by 2050. The decarbonisation project – which will see swathes of the countryside switched to solar farms – will inevitably put food security and our already fragile farming industry at risk but still the Miliband-led madness continues.
We’ve long feared net zero was a Trojan Horse for the destruction of our capitalist economy. In Labour’s hands, it’s well under way. And should we even get started on immigration? The latest projection from the Office for National Statistics suggests our population will grow to 72.5 million by 2032 – putting yet more strain on our creaking infrastructure. Yet have we heard anything substantive from Home Secretary Yvette Cooper about this? No.
Make no mistake, the Prime Minister and his cabinet pose a Keir and present danger to Britain."
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/01/31/labour-cabinet-keir-and-present-danger/
Keir Starmer and his cronies are literally a greater threat to the UK than even Hitler was. Energy is everything.
On the choice between stupidity and malice, I would go with malice. He's never forgiven us for not voting into power when he was the labour leader.
Reports are coming in that Ed Millibrain is proposing that the government buy vast swathes of the Yorkshire Dales to establish massive hamster farms. We'd only need about 124 billion billion hamsters powering hamster wheels to meet the energy requirements specified by NESO for new data centres.
Most of Northumbria has been earmarked for bug production in order to feed the hamsters (and maybe us). The only slight problem is that they still haven't figured out how to limit the potential damage to the climate caused by hamster farts.
I'd also thought about putting Just Stop Oil protesters in a warehouse in Milton Keynes and forcing them to ride exercise bikes connected to the grid.
Agree with all your recommendations but when will British public wake up? They voted in Labor and tolerated the Tories so don't hold your breath.
Stargate is farce dreamt up by Billionaires (close to Trump but Musk sees through the project?). We conservatives can only hope he can convince the Boss Man T.
Would somebody pass grandfathers' old service revolver, to the Government and guide them round the back of the stables, where they can put us out of our misery by.... you can guess the rest.
Can't wait for the announcement that Britain won't be importing natural gas for climate reasons. That will probably be next.
That's what the Climate and Nature Bill aims to do. It got kicked into the long grass, but apparently, Miliband held talks with the backers.
https://davidturver.substack.com/p/climate-and-nature-bill-is-our-year-zero
Excellent!
Agree with all, but we shouldn't try to mimick the mindless Stargate project. Deepseek demonstrates that clever software works better than monopolistic hardware.
"Deepseek demonstrates that industrial espionage works better than monopolistic hardware." FIFY.
Maybe and if correct it shows you how much the American public is being ripped off by the tech billionaires then.