The Lights Will Go Out: Official

You won't find this on the Daily Telegraph site, it was a filler in the paper. But was picked up by Anthony Watts ( HERE )

I am actually left speechless by this. I am so angry.

Is this bloke Holliday having a laugh? Does he not realise that people DIE when the electricity fails. OK they are usually only the OLD and the FRAIL or the POOR.

I suppose it is only fair to say: Who in the glitterati  gives a toss about them?

This is UNBELIEVABLE.

Are we so screwed as a country that we are completely and utterly in the awe of people who simply express mindless dogma and then justify any travesty, any stupidity just so they can maintain their quasi-religious zeal for ridiculous white elephants like wind turbines?

JESUS H CHRIST. I am SO angry about this.

There is NO EXCUSE. At all, of any description.

This is supposed to be a civilised country with a highly developed infrastructure. Why the hell  should we have to expect power cuts?

This is all because assorted stupid, ignorant fools like Chris Huhne and their mindless parody of a government insist on following dogma rather than common sense.

The last government caused the basis of this crisis. But the present government has (or had) a narrow window to dig us out of the pit.

It is not that they failed. It is that they did not even try.

They would rather sentence people to death rather than address the problem and risk losing their false green aura.

When (not if) the lights go out -

When old people freeze to death because the either cannot afford electricity or their boiler will  not light-

When the poor and needy have to choose between freezing or starving-

There will be only one person to blame.

Chris Huhne could have fixed this but chose not to. He chose not to fix it for the worst of political reasons, firmly backed up by his own stupidity and dogma.

Chris Huhne will be the culprit for very many ( tens of thousands ) deaths.

Chris Huhne (even now) should go before a court and explain why he did nothing except line the pockets of the gold-diggers saddling us with useless wind generation while simultaneously crippling the real generating ability of the nation.

If he had the slightest amount of decency in his body he would resign and then let somebody else with a better grip on reality try and pick up the pieces.

I hope in the future this fool and his sycophants are subjected to a public enquiry and they are held up to the public ridicule they so richly deserve.

But that  humiliation will not be witnessed by the true victims of this fool and his policies.

They will be cold, very cold - in their graves.

Wind Turbines and Spinning Reserve

When the supporters of wind turbines run out of wishful thinking they usually try disparaging the legitimate concerns of those of us who view these ineffective monstrosities with the contempt they deserve.

It has long been pointed out that due to the vaguaries of the wind, there needs to be a backup ready to take over when they stop turning. The latest jolly wheeze our dreamworld compatriots have come up with is that there does not need to be any more backup as there is already enough spinning reserve.

For those who do not know the jargon: We have our power supplied mainly by base load generation. That is power stations running on full load. Nuclear power is particularly good at this. This is then backed up by spinning reserve. This spinning reserve can provide small corrections to the power requirement in which case it is said to go from spinning reserve and into generation. But is there mainly ready to kick in if anything goes wrong, like a major grid failure or power station failure. Spinning reserve power stations are using fuel but providing no electricity. The energy used is dissipated in the cooling towers.

The pro wind turbine lobby assert that as the spinning reserve is bigger than any single power supply unit then it should also be quite capable of coping with any drop of output from wind turbines. On a (very) shallow level that sounds like a good point but really we need to look at what the spinning reserve is there for.

Spinning reserve is an emergency backup. Its  size is calculated to allow the grid to cope with major failure of otherwise reliable and predictable components.

And that is the point. 

The major failure of a power station is a crisis and the spinning reserve is there to ensure there are no power cuts. The spinning reserve currently built into the system is most certainly not there to iron out the erratic output of wind turbines as well. 

If (god forbid) anyone actually builds another of these off-shore wind farm abortions and it then suffered a major grid failure, well: Yes. That is what the spinning reserve is for.  

But  it is most certainly not there to cope with the wind suddenly dropping. If you want to cope with that you need more spinning reserve.

The most shocking aspect of the pro-turbine dreamers is their sheer propensity to be at best, economical with the truth and at worst, lie through their teeth.

One day we will look back on all this lunacy and view it with derision. I just hope and pray that when that day comes the lights will still be working. 

The Coming Dark Age

Billothewisp would like to reassure his readers that he does not believe Western civilisation is about to collapse.

He is though seriously concerned about the clock ticking us down to an energy famine. An energy famine that, in eight to ten years time will have a catastrophic effect on jobs, society and especially on the old and frail.

I use the word “will” rather than “may” because arguably it is already too late.

The lights will go out.

In ten years our generating capability is likely to be so compromised, so under resourced and so out of date that even if Chris Huhne saw the light and ordered 15 nuclear power stations tomorrow, there still would be a shortage.

But there is no real likely-hood of Chris Huhne doing anything of the sort.
(See Telegraph article here)

He says Nuclear power is a “failed technology”. Tell that to the French, who currently top up our already inadequate supplies from their (85% Nuclear) power grid. Even tell it to the UK where 25% has been reliably and continuously provided for 30 years by nuclear.

Our nuclear power generation is going to decrease not because there is any flaw in it but simply because the stations are old and need to be retired.

Chris Huhne continues to clutch at a truly failed power option, that of wind generation. Wind power has its niches, but it is incapable of keeping the lights on or the wheels of industry turning. It is time Mr Huhne put the future victims of an energy shortage above his personal dogma.

The clock is ticking.

Unless something effective is done very soon, people will die.

I have two urgent words of warning for Mr Huhne.

Tick Tock.