Storms, Climate Change & an Economy of Truth.

You've heard the rhetoric. Global Warming/Climate Change/Climate Emergency is increasing severe weather events. There will be more storms. More destruction.

Statements like this from my friends in Greenpeace (of whom I have none) Link Here 

[quote]

“The frequency and strength of storms is increasing, leaving destruction in their wake.”

[unquote]

Lurid stuff. Frightening even.

But is it true?

Is the frequency and strength of storms increasing?

The answer to that is No.

The frequency and strength of storms is not increasing. In fact for the last thirty years the average wind speed across large sections of the planet have been in decline, as have severe storm events. You can trace a slowing in global wind speeds right back to the 1960's.

From Antarctica right up to near the North Pole wind speeds have been going down.

I’ll concentrate here on the UK but this really is a global phenomena. (see references later)

Here is the frequency of high wind gusts events across the UK by year which the Met Office states they use as an indicator of "storminess".

Notice all gusts are in decline and that includes the extreme gusts that are supposed to be increasing. (MET office Data taken from Here)

Even though they have adopted a silly storm naming scheme (one suspects in order to add a little drama to otherwise common or garden weather events) the Met Office have come out and made clear that there is no link between Global Warming and UK storm frequency.

But they cannot quite bring themselves to reference their own data showing a slow decline in storminess since the 1990's. The Met Office webpage on Wind Storms is Here

The global slowing of wind speed is emphatic and serious enough to now be a research project for EU. (Here)

Even dear old Wikipedia has a (somewhat rudimentary) page on it Here

The best page is probably This Page from the Institute of Physics. (with caveats – see later)

Here’s a few more links that give useful insight into the phenomena.

ABC News Australia

Cosmo Magazine

Nature Magazine

So, while the panic laden Drama Queens in Greenpeace and Extinction Rebellion would like you to think that storms are dangerously increasing, actually the reverse is true.

Bad things always happen. There will always be storms. But today there are less of them and they are less potent.

But you will not hear anyone suggesting that this is a “good thing”.

Even the Phys.org article above struggled hard to find some bad outcomes yet failed to address any of the advantages of lower wind speed and less storms.

Yet when we look to (say) coastal defence, less storms mean coastal defence systems last longer. Less storms mean less storm surges. Less storms mean less wind damage. Less lost work days and less insurance claims.

The list goes on.

Even a merely lower average wind speed must result in less wear and tear on external structures. I am sure you can think a few more advantages of what is in essence more benign weather. 

By the way while the linked reports are all reasonably recent, this is far from new knowledge. Its just appears to have been kept pretty quiet until now.

It is interesting to note that while these reports all mention the possible ill affect on wind-turbines the reports make great efforts to (incorrectly) indicate that little is known about the wind speed at wind-turbine height.

I first blogged on it and how it can affect the wind turbine farce using data from Garrard-Hassan. But that data from 2011 which shows the slowing of wind speed across Northern Europe seems to have been (how should we say…) overlooked.

The full 2011 post is Here: Wind Speed Decline: A Blip or a Trend?

Here's the Garrard Hassan graph (this only goes to 2005)

But whatever the effects on marginal power producers, clearly wind speed is something that is getting more benign. Maybe it is due to Global Warming, maybe not. But whatever, wind speed is not getting worse.

Global Warming may well have deleterious affects. But (like this) there may also be positive outcomes

It’s just nobody wants to tell you about them.

Is there Something (Else) Wrong with Wind Power?

We all know wind power is intermittent. I thought I would take a look at how predictable windpower intermittency is and how accurate wind power output predictions are.

In the process I think I have tripped over a new issue regarding wind generation (but more on that later).

The bmreports site (HERE) has a section on wind generation and shows a graph of an original output prediction, a more recent and accurate revised prediction and also the actual out-turn.

The original forecast value is done 41 hours before the start of the forecasted day. The revised forecast is done 4 hours before the start of the forecasted day. The predictions use weather forecast data for the known wind farm locations and factor in a range of other parameters. These are sophisticated predictions and are probably as good as they get.

Here is a few example snap shots taken in the last month from the bmreports site.

But as well as this continuously updated graph, bmreports also publish the same 3 day data as an xml file. I've collected the xml files for one month. (Annoyingly I missed two days so these have been left out. But even so I think this is quite a good data set.)

Above is a graph of this data showing the final revised prediction done 4 hours before the start of the predicted day (red) and the final out-turn (blue).

(I've left out the original prediction as for obvious reasons, it was more in error of the final out-turn and so added little to the graph). Note: Actual metered capacity is actually 8972MW so the graph is unduly kind stopping at 8000.)

The first thing that can be seen is that the out-turn is often (not occasionally) in significant variance with the predictions. The graphs may be the same shape but the values at any one point in time are often significantly different. Clearly, any system with a large wind component that relied completely on even a near term forecast (and without spinning reserve) would soon end up in deep trouble.

So whatever the pro-wind zealots preach on Twitter, the problem with lack of wind power predictability has not gone away. Neither has its intermittency.

But potentially the example bmreports graphs (as well as mine) also show another problem. 

Notice in the above graphs how on the occasions the wind output rises above about 30% capacity (3000MW), during the rise, the out-turn lags the predictions and the maximum out-turn is significantly less than either of the predictions. 

It is as if a large proportion of wind turbines exposed to a rising wind and high wind periods are being feathered (or throttled back) for some reason during these periods.

At lower wind speeds there are still periods of great discrepancy between prediction and output but the tracking between prediction and output does appear more coherent. (Remember this forecast was done 4 hours before start of predicted day!)

Wind energy companies only get paid when they are generating. So why would they throttle back their turbines in high winds?

And the answer to that I believe is good old repair and maintenance.

For almost any machine, if you run it lightly it lasts longer. Take a car. The harder you drive a car the more wear and tear it suffers. Just about all rotating machinery obey this simple rule – including wind turbines.

We know that there is a severe generic problem with wind turbine gearbox reliability. (See This Post - The Ghost in the Gearbox and Post - More Ghosts in the Gearbox )

I would suspect that it has been found that if the loading on a wind turbine gets above a certain value the wear rate and maintenance/repair cost will be far more than the return from the extra energy generation.

So maybe operators are unilaterally and quietly deciding that when the wind gets too changeable or too strong, the turbines will be run at reduced output compared to what they are supposed to be capable of.

Wind turbines are capital intensive. If you suffer a catastrophic failure you will ruin the huge and guaranteed profit (subsidy included) your turbines can make. Do it too many times and you may end up going bust. Better to ignore the whole reasoning, propaganda and hype associated with why the thing was built in the first place and go for the low hanging fruit.

Remember most windfarms have a 25 year subsidy regime locked in place. It's a nice little earner. Operators are going to do whatever it takes to maximise the financial gain over this period and if that includes reducing output to make their gearboxes and other expensive components last a bit longer then they will do it. The abatement of Carbon Dioxide can go to hell.

This, of course, makes an even bigger mockery of the often hyped “Installed Capacity” figure than it already is. It also shows how the unreliability of these machines impacts the supposed reason they were built.

It means that wind power is perhaps even more useless and under-achieving than first thought.

I cannot prove the operators are intentionally throttling back their turbines to reduce their maintenance bills. 

But I bet I'm right.

Energy Storage: The Trouble with Power to Gas

There is a fundamental law of Physics called the Law of Conservation of Energy.

It's a real bitch.

Basically it demands that whatever the system you use, you can never get more energy out of it than you put in. So many beautiful dreams have come to naught - just because of this one damn law.

Even so there should be an adjunct to the law of conservation of energy. Something more like a serious health warning really.

Something like:

"Whenever you change from one form of energy to another - you will get screwed."

And I mean really screwed.

If on your last foreign holiday you thought changing currency was robbery then believe me, that was as nothing compared to the losses when changing energy form.

Truly, energy can neither be created or destroyed. But Oh Boy can it get "mislaid" dispersed or changed into unwanted useless forms whenever you try to convert one form into another.

You always (and I mean ALWAYS) end up with less than you started with. Mostly you end up with significantly less.

How good a system is at converting energy is its energy efficiency. It can never-ever be more than 100%.

90% is mind bogglingly good.

An old 19th century steam engine by comparison is about 10% efficient - on a good day.

By burning fossil fuels and liberating their stored chemical energy as heat and then changing that heat (from burning coal or gas) into electricity - you will lose about 50% of the energy as waste heat up the chimney. Still, we do it because electricity is far more useful to us than a lump of coal or a pocket of trapped gas.

Now, what would be the best way to store the energy in (say) gas for a rainy day?

Would it be by just not burning it until needed? Or would be by converting it to electriciy (50% loss) and then post generation converting it back to something else? (say another 50% loss)

I hope it is obvious that by doing a "gas->electricity->something else" you will get royally screwed. In this example you would end up with 25% of what you started with.

You are far, far better off not burning the gas until needed.

Wind turbines and solar PV do not have the luxury of having their energy pre-stored like coal, gas or nuclear. If there is excess generation by wind or solar they either waste the available energy by not converting it or they have to convert it to electricity and then convert it again to some other storeable energy form.

So, with wind (or solar) you have no option but to bear the pain and go with:

"wind->electricity->something else".

One of the much hyped "something elses" for wind/solar is called Power to Gas (Wikipedia article Here).

Twitter is alive with excited windies who see Power to Gas as the the "Great Breakthough" - The mythical silver bullet that will slay the demon problem of energy storage for wind/solar.

To be fair, Power to Gas is technically clever. It takes any excess electricity from wind/solar and via some clever chemistry uses it to generate flammable gas - either hydrogen or methane. This can then be stored and used at some later date either for heat or electricity generation..

The trouble with Power to Gas is is not the cleverness of the technology. The trouble is that damn law of physics about energy conservation. Especially the health warning attached to it.

Turning electricity to potential chemical energy (gas) is at best 75% efficient but more realistically it is around 60%. Then turning that gas back to electricity again reduces the overall efficiency to around 40% at best or more realistically about 30%. In other words we lose about two thirds of the energy - Of course the missing 2/3rds is not destroyed. It is simply just dissipated and lost to the system.

Remember this proposed technique is there to bale-out an already massively subsidized generator. Even if you totally ignore the actual cost of plant and plant operation the price of the re-generated electricity would have to be three times that of the source price just to stay level.

In reality though the price of Power to Gas has been estimated at anything from £500-1000 MWh. Or from 10 to 20 times as expensive as current gas/coal/nuclear generation.

A whole order of magnitude more expensive. Breathtaking!

Power to Gas is a nice idea. It may even have some practical niche applications. But storing excess energy from wind and solar? Dream on.

And all because of that damn law about the Conservation of Energy.

Yet Another Damning Wind Power Report

Another detailed and peer reviewed report on the effectiveness of wind power has been recently published by the Adam Smith Institute. (h/t to @strumcrazy at twitter)

The report has been produced by an Engineer with a long history in the power generation industry including pumped hydro. It's data is unimpeachable and is based on reliable wind speed data obtained from airport meteorology stations. 

The summary is brutally factual and casts a long black shadow over all the vacuous hype over wind power recently seen in the UK.

The document is available Here

Here are some of those brutal facts. (but by no means all)

Over one year the UK model showed:

Power exceeds 90% of available power for only 17 hours

Power exceeds 80% of available power for 163 hours

Power is below 20% of available power for 3,448 hours (20 weeks)

Power is below 10% of available power for 1,519 hours (9 weeks)

The most common output of the entire theoretical 10GW UK wind turbine fleet is 800MW or 8%.

The probability that the wind fleet will produce full output is vanishingly small.

Long gaps in significant wind production occur in all seasons.

To cover these gaps would need energy storage equivalent to 15 Dinorwig size plants (incidentally Dinorwig cost £1.5Bn. It is also not far short of being geologically unique in the UK – Billo)

As we cannot build 15 Dinorwig's in the UK we could do what the German Energiewende is doing and build dirty Lignite burning coal plant instead as backup. ( that is not a serious suggestion by the way)

Of course, if this was just one paper, however scrupulously prepared, we may well be entitled to a level of skepticism about its findings.

But this is very far from the first.

In 2010 The famous Nature conservancy charity “The John Muir Trust” commissioned a report by Stuart Young Consulting. The John Muir Trust webpage on this report (with link) is Here The actual Paper on its own is Here

Stuart Young Consulting (using actual generation data) found the following:

Over a two year period (2008-10) The UK wind turbine fleet was:

• below 20% of capacity more than half the time
• below 10% of capacity over one third of the time
• below 2.5% capacity for the equivalent of one day in twelve
• below 1.25% capacity for the equivalent of just under one day a month

Again that is just a subset of the dismal performance they found.

Does it stop there? – No. Here are a few more reports:

Reports by:

Mercados Consulting – Powerful Targets (2012 originally suppressed by UK govt.) Link Here

Civitas – The Folly of Windpower (2012) Link Here

Prof. G Hughs Edinburgh University - Why Is Wind Power So Expensive? (2012) Link Here

The Royal Academy of Engineers – The Cost of Generating Electricity (2004) Link Here

Note that the oldest of these reports dates back some 10 years. This is not new knowledge but it has been comprehensively buried and suppressed by the wind industry and their political backers.

But as the saying goes: 

The truth will out.

Wind Turbine Design, Cube Laws, Efficiency and Cock Ups

Well, I have to 'fess up to having made an error regarding the output characteristics of modern day Industrial Wind Turbines.

A silly mistake at that.

But possibly a mistake that also reveals some interesting possibilities with wind turbines. Especially related to reducing their size, noise and increasing useful power output.

Crack Pottery? Possibly. But I've not been at the cider yet. (honest)

First, in order for this post to make sense, let me summarise some things that ARE true.

• The energy in the wind is a cube of the speed. In other words if you double the wind speed – wind contains 8 x energy. Halve wind speed- wind contains one eighth the energy.

• The theoretical maximum amount of this raw wind energy that can be harvested is 59.3% (Betz's Law)

• In reality the most efficient turbines manage about 45% (at a wind speed of around 7-8 m/s).

All of the above are correct. (Or I really am in trouble!)

My mistake in some earlier posts was to assume the efficiency of a wind turbine was roughly constant across the operational wind speed range (up to maximum output). 

Sadly this is nowhere near true.

In reality the efficiency (or how much energy the wind turbine can actually suck out of the wind) drops like a stone as the wind speed increases.

For most industrial wind turbines the highest efficiency (at around a wind speed of 7m/s) is about 45%. But as the wind speed increases, the efficiency falls to around 10% at a 90% loading.

The overall effect of this is to roughly linearise the power output to the wind speed. So instead of getting eight times the power out when you double the wind speed you only get double the power out. The rest is spilled.

So what does this matter if the thing is only as efficient as a 19^th century steam engine when confronted with a high wind?

It matters a lot.

Way back in 2002 at the Lee Ranch wind turbine research facility in New Mexico, it was discovered that 50% of the annual energy output of a wind turbine was delivered in 15% of the time. 

My own analysis done back in 2011 showed that for a three month period the whole UK wind turbine fleet delivered 50% of its energy in 25% of the time. But remember that was for the whole distributed fleet. 

It would be reasonable to assume that for a single facility, the Lee Ranch figures are roughly correct for the UK too. Also, there is no reason to think any design change to wind turbines since 2002 will have significantly affected these Lee Ranch findings.

In order to harvest the 50% of the energy that is smeared out over 85% of the year you have to compromise the turbines efficiency at higher wind speeds. The result today is an enormous unreliable monster.

So, for a moment, let us forget about the grindingly low 50% of energy generation that gets smeared over 85% of the year. Let us concentrate on the other 50% that arrives in 15% of the time (currently at an efficiency of a measly 10-15%).

For arguments sake, let us design a turbine that may not cut in until the wind speed is 12 or 14 m/s but then delivers an efficiency of 40%. It will (MWhr for MWhr) be very much smaller, simpler and more robust than a conventional turbine. 

OK it will only operate for 15% of the time and it is truly intermittent. But all wind is intermittent. Remember a conventional turbines output during 85% of the year is pretty derisory anyway. Often it is so low that it might as well not be there.

So, build smaller more efficient turbines. Crucially, in order to make these turbines more efficient, they only operate at higher wind speeds. We then rely on gas backup for the rest. More predictable, less environmental impact and more reliable (due to narrower operating domain). 

Tell me where I'm wrong. (Seriously - I may well be)

Of course this is still all window dressing. This (and the rest of RE) is just Care Bear fluff. Nuclear plant (with some gas) is the ONLY viable option to cut GHG and air pollution.  

But I hope that this is at least “interesting” fluff.

Wrecking the Sea Bed with Offshore Wind Part 5

This is the fifth and last in a series of posts about the damage done to the sea floor by offshore "Wind Parks". Data has been taken from the proposed Navitus bay wind park consultation documents (Available On This Link) which are also available on a DVD. The main files are:
PEI3_Ch2_NavitusBayWindParkProject.pdf  ( Link HERE )
PEI3_Ch5_PhysicalProcesses.pdf  ( Link HERE )
PEI3-Ch_9_benthicecology.pdf (Link HERE)
PEI3_Ch_10_fishandshellfishecology.pdf ( Link HERE )

I hope I have shown in the first four posts (using the Navitus' own documentation) that the small power plant that would be Navitus Bay Offshore Wind park will involve massive damage to the seabed.

Just to summarise from previous posts: 

The foundations will  involve ripping up around one and a half million tonnes of seabed. This damage coupled with disposal of the spoil will wreck around 1000 acres of sea bed - or around a total of 4 square kilometers.  

Several hundred miles of undersea cabling will involve trenching, ploughing and jetting into the sea-floor. The debris will spray out, burying everything within a 5 -20 meter wide corridor. Though a plume of finer debris will extend much further. So another 1000 acres (or another four square kilometers) of sea bed will be trashed. 

On top of this cabling sea bed disturbance, there will be dumped  over a third of a million tonnes of rock debris to protect the cables from being accidentally trawled up.

But it does not stop there. There is even more rock debris required. This rock is known as anti-scour.

Anti Scour

The Navitus Wind Park (like any other offshore wind farm) will need thousands of tonnes of imported rock piled around the bases of turbines to prevent the foundations being undermined by scouring. 

This anti-scour rock debris will essentially form a foreign and unnatural marine environment around about 30% of the turbines. Typically, each anti-scour ring will measure  25 meters in diameter and be 2 meters thick. (para 2.70)

A ring that size will account for about 1000 tonnes of rock debris per turbine or around 70,000 tonnes in total for the proposed 30% of turbines (para 2.68) that will need the anti-scour.

In addition to this there is additional anti-scour to cover the cable entry points (this is in addition to the rock used for cable protection described in a previous post). This will be needed on an unspecified proportion of turbines requiring anti-scour (para 2.71). Assuming 40 turbines need this and it will be as thick as the anti-scour itself then this will be another 30,000 tonnes of rock debris.

In total the anti-scour alone will involve importing another one hundred thousand tonnes of foreign rock and dumping it into the marine environment directly off the World Heritage Jurassic Coast.

The suffocation of the natural environment around these turbines by building what are essentially artificial and foreign habitats will no doubt, over time, also import foreign wildlife into the area (as has happened elsewhere - para 9.121). With the excavation and  dumped spoil, this anti-scour will inevitably skew the current balance of the existing wildlife within the turbine area. No doubt some species will prosper. But others may collapse as they struggle to compete in what is to them an artificial and chaotically changed environment. Sadly though it does not end there.

Effect on Tidal Flows


Although the potential gains from this scheme are pitifully poor, it will still be a huge artificial structure. In fact a structure so enormous and so intrusive on the natural environment that it will actually slow down the tidal flow rate by 7% within the turbine area and cause a flow speed increase outside. In an area already suffering from considerable marine coastal erosion, having a structure that speeds up tidal flows north (i.e. landward) of this structure would appear to be careless - to say the least. (para 5.325)

Finally I'll point out that this thing is so big and intrusive on the natural environment it could actually cause a change of tidal phase where the peak rate of flow may be retarded by a full 10 minutes (para 5.325).

Finally I would like to bring up a topic nobody is talking about although I suspect it is a topic many involved with this project are fully aware of.

Sea-bed Methane Release

Coastal sediments can potentially hold large quantities of Methane ( see paper Reindl & Bolalek link - Here ) & ( paper Mascharka, Montross, & Pierrehumbert link - Here )

Whenever you disturb ancient coastal sediments you are guaranteed to release trapped seabed Methane. Large Dredgers (as an example) are usually fitted with methane extraction and venting equipment to prevent the risk of explosion (See The Art of Dredging - Here ). But here the problem is not so much tied up with an explosion risk as to the fact that methane is a green house gas 20 times as potent as CO2. 

It would be high farce for this monstrosity to be built only to do more damage to the atmosphere than it is optimistically slated to offset. It is difficult to see how that trenching and ploughing an area equating to 1000 acres then excavating a million and a half tonnes of seabed can do anything but release copious quantities of trapped coastal seabed methane. 

Somehow this possibility appears to have been missed out of the Navitus documentation altogether.

So finally - What Exactly will be the Environmental Gain?

Sadly the pillage and destruction described here are just the tip of the ice-berg. 

In these few posts I have dealt solely with a sub-set of the sea-bed damage caused by offshore wind farms. Nobody seems to have publicly paid much attention to this, although to be fair English Heritage has raised the alarm (table 9.2). Perhaps the surface calamities threatened by these offshore projects are so awful they push other unseen destruction to the back of people's minds.

A very good site detailing other major problems with offshore wind (particularly Navitus) is on this link - Challenge Navitus - Here 

Most of all though, let us just remember that all this destruction and upset to a fragile and internationally recognised coastal region is to provide a SMALL intermittent power supply of typical daily output of 250 MWe or less.

Even then, simply to be viable, this offshore wind farm will have to be paid around three times the typical electricity wholesale cost.

If we leave aside the quasi-religious zeal, the vacuous fashionability and the endemic greed that drives this foolishness, can anyone really give a good reason to desecrate this coast (or any other) for so little gain? 

Wind Turbines: The Ghost in the Gearbox

I first came across this shocking industrial wind turbine (IWT) gearbox problem some time back and posted about it (Here) and originally (Here). The basis of these posts was this article (Here)

This long running problem is so serious that since 2007, the US Government has been coordinating research into it through the NREL. (More on that further down.)

By the looks of it nothing has got better, although there is a lot of industry spin claiming the fix is just over the hill. Some of it quite recent  (See Here)

So what is the problem and why is it kept so quiet?

Industrial Wind turbines (IWT's) have a generic, long standing and apparently intractible problem with gearbox reliability.

Many gearboxes need a rebuild within 5 -7 years instead of lasting 25 years as designed. Many suffer catastrophic failure within the 5-7 period or even earlier. Depending on the age of the turbine, a gear box failure may effectively write it off. Even when repaired, these gearbox failures are highly expensive and often take out the turbine for months.

Replacing the gearbox adds massively to the overall cost of the IWT. Manufacturers increase the cost to cover warranty repairs in the first 5 years. When out of warranty, the cost of a maintenance contract sky-rockets, eventually to a point where the operation of the IWT becomes untenable.

Why does this matter? After all it is the operators/manufacturers problem isn't it?

It matters because IWT's are capital intensive. That means that most of their operating cost is mostly soaked up in purchasing the thing - and maintaining it. If the IWT has a much shorter life (or a much higher maintenance cost) and so produces less money than anticipated, their ability to ever live without massive government subsidy becomes an even bigger illusion than it already is.

So, you may say, "It is only a technical glitch ...it 'll all come right in the end."

Well, maybe. But first of all this is a glitch that has lasted since the 1980's

Unfortunately the evidence suggests that nobody actually knows what to fix yet let alone how too fix it. So possibly the answer is - maybe not.

We need to get an idea of how bad this problem is but for obvious reasons the wind industry isn't telling and they are certainly not releasing any meaningful figures

But there are a number of alarming markers out there.

The  US Government (in association with the wind industry) formed a little known group called the "Gearbox Reliability Collaborative" (GRC) (See Here) ** The GRC is no less than a section of the USA government NREL. (That National Renewable Energy Laboratory).

** [2017 - This website is no longer publicly available and returns a 404. The advertising brochure for the GRC is still publicly available at This Link. It appears the research papers linked to below are also still available]

In other words the problem is so bad the US Government is having to tackle the problem.

The leading sentence on the GRC website blandly states...
[quote]
Premature gearbox failures have a significant impact on the cost of wind farm operations.
[unquote]

To quote from the latest finding report from GRC testing...(Here)
[quote]
Despite reasonable adherence to these accepted design practices, many wind turbine gearboxes do not achieve their design life goals of 20 years—most systems still require significant repair or overhaul well before the intended life is reached. 
[unquote]

These guys in the NRC are (to put it mildly) clever people. But they have been at this since 2007 and so far they are still, by all appearances, quantifying the problem. In otherwords on a scale of ten, the intractibility of the gearbox issue probably rates a nine.

The NREL does not allocate such significant resources lightly. This is a bad problem.

The GRC are trying to build a failure database as well as running a series of tests on prototype gearboxes. Unfortunately this failure database is not for public consumption and is subject to a strict NDA so we will probably never know the full facts.

Manufacturing members of the GRC can (and mostly do) remain anonymous. One exception is Vestas. While I have little time for any wind industry company at least Vestas appear to be willing to stand up and be identified rather than just pretend their is no problem like the rest.

Of course, while we do not have full access to the database we do have some access to data held within it from the research papers published by GRC

For example, from an early sample set from 2010 and This Paper  covering 37 failures we have this:

Notice that while this early table covers 37 failures there were many more problems found in the strip downs. It looks like the problem is poorly localised and is probably caused by a number of different issues.

So what is the point of this post?

Simply to show that the current fleet of IWTs (yes - whole fleet ) are really not fit for a production environment. They are still suffering intractible and major operational problems and are highly unlikely to ever be able to operate without a huge government subsidy. To suggest they have a lifespan of 25 years is laughable.

This is bad enough for land based turbines.

But anyone who suggests that we can successfully and economically place these things out in the North Sea and English Channel for long term energy generation, is in need of medication.

Denmark vs France. Place your Bets.

So, my grubby little Englanders,

We have a contest. Who is your money on?.......

For those who track along with AGW -  who cuts the most Carbon?
For those who don't track with AGW - who cuts the most Pollution?

We must not forget that our Power production options are not just related to Carbon Dioxide emissions. It is also about air pollution as well. (Ask anyone enduring the raging Indonesian smoke haze if you doubt me)

Come on. Place your bets.

Is it Nuclear France? or "Renewables" Denmark?

Sit back and watch the video......

(h/t to Brave New Climate)

The Coming Dark Age - Revisited

I did not know whether to laugh or cry when I read these articles in the Independent today (HERE) and (HERE) In these articles the outgoing head of OfGem moans about the looming "Energy Gap" and inevitable price hikes that are on their way. Evidently, we are now so far down the road the only option we have to potentially avert the crisis is to build gas plant using expensive imported gas.

Dare I point out that I first blogged about this in 2010 ( HERE ) and I was a long way from being the first. In the industry this has been an issue for the last 10 years. Both of the last governments (but particularly the last Labour administration) are guilty of letting this drift. Due to the time scales the looming energy supply catastrophe can only now be potentially offset by gas - whatever the cost.

That AND possibly keeping old and decrepit coal plant running.

What a state to get into.

All because vacuous politicians have preferred to pursue the fools gold of renewables and simultaneously shun new nuclear.

But nuclear companies are no different than any other large ruthless corporate entity. Worldwide today, it is a lucrative sellers market for nuclear manufacturers. So now, when we are at or past crisis point the politico's are being held to ransom. The nuclear companies are demanding their pound of flesh. What a turn around.

We are told that "power cuts are unlikely" This is almost certainly just more wishful thinking.
Our generation capacity is going to fall to almost parity to what is needed. Any outage is going to stretch things to breaking point. A large outage in a serious cold snap or a double break down is going to see serious and widespread blackouts.

What will the politico's do? I reckon they will try and wing it. They will hope for mild weather and no breakdowns. God help us all.

This is terrible.

All of that money! All of that national resource wasted on the useless unreliable wind. All of the prevarication and navel gazing over nuclear and shale gas. All of that "Do Nothing and Hope It goes away" attitude.

At best the end result will be a stretched and unreliable power supply dominated by ancient coal and expensive imported gas, with wind adding little but a feel good factor for the technically illiterate.

Of course there will a diminishing contribution from our old first generation nuclear plant as well.
Inevitably this is going to be forced into an ever extended lifespan and run flat-out just to save the asses of our great and good.

What a waste. What a scandal.

The Ghost of Winfrith

Today it is hard to believe that just outside Winfrith, a small village in Dorset, there used to be one of the most dynamic and technologically advanced locations in the world. All there is now is a fading building, some rusty sidings and a halting and occasional de-commissioning exercise.

The decommisioning is run by RSRL, or to give it it's full name - Research Sites Restoration Ltd - See Here. The old Winfrith site is set among trees and is well back from the road. Today most drive past without even noticing it.

Winfrith was a nuclear  research facility but it never held a large reactor. The largest was a mere tiddler with a maximum power rating of 63 MW.

Even though this was designed specifically for research purposes it still provided a useful, regular and reliable output to the grid of 50MW.

While it was in operation, Winfrith was serviced by many small companies all based in the surrounding area. These companies were in turn serviced by other small companies providing everything from stainless steel to sandwiches.

Today the remains of the once dynamic industrial site between Winfrith and Wool, now renamed Dorset Green, is a mere shadow of its former self. Most of the jobs, along with the carbon free power generation from the Winfrith reactor are long gone.

It is interesting to compare the effectiveness of the 60 year old Winfrith research reactor to recent plans for so called "renewable" energy in Dorset.

Last year the Dorset Energy Group were bragging about a "reasonable scenario" of building 180 2MW turbines in Dorset. Frustratingly for the zealots in the DEG this number has evidently now been trimmed down, or at least obfuscated so not to frighten the locals.

Let's say the 100 turbines would now be their dream target.

We know that in 2010 the wind turbine capacity factor for the South West was a measly 17.7% (the lowest in the country). But let us round it up and say that these turbines would be over 10% better than their peers elsewhere in the South West.

That gives us a capacity factor of about 20%.

So the output of these 100 turbines would actually amount to 100 x 0.2 x 2 = 40MW.

These turbines would bring very few jobs and no technologically based business park. Virtually nothing would be added to the local economy. The only real local gains would be made by the already rich land owners who, to be fair, would make a killing.

These 100 turbines would utterly ruin the ancient county of Dorset. Every village would be blighted. Every viewpoint would be polluted.

All for 40MW.

Reduce the number of turbines and you also reduce the already ridiculously poor power output. So they get even more ineffective. Though collectively somewhat less ugly.

Now compare that to the old Winfrith site that provided many good jobs and singlehandedly provided the power equivalent to 120 huge wind turbines. Remember also that the tiny Winfrith reactor also provided consistent on-demand output unlike the intermittent and unpredictable wind turbine output.

Most of the people who designed Winfrith have not only retired but many have now died of old age. Yet 60 odd years ago they produced plentiful carbon free electricity that was, at the time, generated by the very leading edge of technology.

If you really wanted to reduce carbon emissions from coal and gas plant then even the old Winfrith research reactor would be a step forward from the wind turbine fiasco.

But today far more effective nuclear technology is available. Exciting new developments with MSR or LFTR technology promise massively plentiful yet utterly safe and secure power generation.

The next generation nuclear reactors will be developed by dynamic establishments - like Winfrith used to be.

Unfortunately Winfrith will no longer be one of them.

Lagging the Roof with Davey

At last! A morsel of common sense from the great and good.  ( See Guardian HERE ). Insulating houses and so REDUCING energy demand is fundamentally a very sound idea.

Household insulation should be at the very front of the government policy and if anything should get a subsidy it should be insulation.

But regrettably our esteemed leaders are still proud wind turbine fashionistas, even though it is these very wind turbines that will undo the good work done by the insulation and force many more thousands into fuel poverty.

Ed Davey, the new Huhne clone has announced that insulation can save as much as 2 Nuclear power stations. (see the above link)

Now I imagine that means a total power of about 2 GW (i.e. two Sizewell B's).

So let us do a comparison with an "average" on-shore wind turbine which is 2MW but has a capacity factor of 25% or less (in the South West - much less).

A little maths tells us that instead of supplanting 2 nuclear power station that produce reliable "dispatchable" power we could .......

dispense with  4000 unreliable, intermittent and massively subsidised wind turbines instead.

(yes that is not a misprint - FOUR THOUSAND - every land based bird mincer in the country plus some more..)

let's see.....

Close down 2  effective nuclear power plants?

Or 4000 ineffective wind turbines?

I know which I would choose.

Not only would we be free of these hopeless white elephants, but the money we would save on NOT paying the ROC subsidy would pay for the whole of the subsidised household insulation - for every home in the country.

The final icing on the cake would be the 250,000 households that would NOT be pushed into fuel poverty simply to line the pockets of the wind turbine carpet baggers.

Government Policy: Leave the Old to Freeze

The interview with Chris Huhne on the Channel 4 news last night was surreal.

He talked continuously, spouting on and on and on. Desperately, he tried to talk out the time time slot and refused to allow the interviewer to get in with her questions.

At times he was literally talking gibberish.

The whole interview amounted to him stringing together sound bites with no coherence or intelligibility. It was a bit like a  Madonna song but without the sex appeal - lots of emotional words strung together that sound good, but in reality  make no sense.

At least Madonna is entertaining.

Huhne point-blank refused to address the issues of fuel poverty and how his policies are forcing millions into penury. He frantically tried to sidestep the government's own figures on how the so called Green Policies are grinding down whole sections of our community. When it got too difficult he simply made it up of the hoof and made himself look even more ridiculous.

I could barely believe that anyone in government could so abjectly and so cynically fail those who need support. Instead he bamboozled and waffled on, trying to deflect focus away from his ridiculous fashion statement "Green Agenda". A policy that is essentially based on hidden taxation. Taxation on the poor to benefit the rich.

When it comes down to it, when you strip away the waffle and obfuscation, Chris Huhne would rather let thousands of pensioners and the poor die of cold rather than call a halt to the current lunatic energy policy.

His laughable solution is to get people to "shop around".

Tell that to the average 80 year old.


Tell the old dear down the road who has never even used a computer that she should use a price comparison site. 


Tell the old boy to "shop around" even though he is in his last days and wheelchair bound.

They all deserve better.

Much, much better than the preposterous Mr Huhne.

When it comes to the final analysis, the Government is responsible for this catastrophe.

This government may well be responsible for picking up many of the failings of the last Labour administration. But they are still responsible. After all that is what they were elected for - to take responsibility.

It is no good trying to deflect the blame onto the veracious big six energy companies. The whole of this debacle is simply down to bad and incompetent government. Both in the past and in the present.

We need a government that is willing and capable of breaking the current energy cartel. We need a government that plans energy policy on best practice not on vacuously fashionable but grossly ineffective solutions like wind power.

There are no excuses. 

If this coming winter, people die or are left freezing, then it is this governments fault.

Of course it is Huhne's fault. But it will also be Cameron's fault. Hague's fault, and all the others.

They are the government. Fixing problem is what they should be about.

Somebody in government has to do something practical about our looming (or loomed) energy crisis. Mouthing platitudes is not enough.

To get things going, one good step forward would be to  give Mr Huhne his P45.

Debunking the Myths

OK. This is a long post. To sweeten the task there is a windtoons cartoon at the end. No cheating.

Perhaps the most obscene aspect to the whole of the wind turbine fiasco is the way the carpet-baggers make up the "facts" to fit their own tawdry little aims. Especially when the truth is somewhat inconvenient. Wide eyed they then go into rant mode in an attempt browbeat everyone into believing their propaganda.

Take this site HERE for example. It is funded by the EU. But look at the bottom of any web page and notice it proudly states it is "co-ordinated by the EWEA" That is the European Wind Energy Association in case you did not know.

To me that sounds a bit like like having NHS Direct run by Glaxo-Smith-Kline-Beecham. Although to be fair to GSKB, I think they would be far more honourable than the average carpet-bagging wind-turbine cartel. But I digress.

On this site they have that favourite set of web pages you find on any of the carpet-bagging websites these days, proudly labelled  "Myths". Evidently our carpet-bagging friends want to enlighten the public by "Debunking the Myths" and show us all how wind energy is not only cheap reliable and non-intermittent but will probably cure cancer and teach you child to read as well.

What you actually get is the usual sad self serving deception and hypocrisy one has come to expect from the bureaucratic elite that runs this farce. When Sir Robert Armstrong used the phase "Economical with the truth" during the spy catcher trial of 1986 he really had no idea how the wind industry would take the meaning of the phase to a much higher level.

So let us look at the first myth they want to debunk. The myth which we all so mistakenly believe i.e.
"Wind power is expensive". Their answer to this "myth" is: (exactly as written:)

[quote]
Wind power ... can compete with other power generation options at good sites.
[unquote]

Now I suspect that a good site to the average carpet-bagger is anywhere they have got planning permission. To the rest of us I suspect a good site would be a windy site. One where, say, the turbine output would meet their often hyped 30% average capacity factor.

Now as you know there are some clever blokes about who love to debunk the debunk. One is called Professor Jefferson who did some research on the whole of the English turbine fleet that was operational for all of 2009 (See pdf Here).

He found that an annual 30% capacity factor was only reached by 7.6% of the turbine fleet. While 74% of the fleet failed to even reach 25% capacity factor. In fact the same percentage (7.6%) of turbines failed to manage 10% as managed to reach 30%.

So, the first deceit here in our "Debunking the Myths" is the "good site" deceit.

If you limited Wind turbines to only "good sites", and assuming that means a site that reaches the often quoted "30%" capacity factor then perhaps they could compete. They forget to mention that this would junk 92% of the turbine fleet in England straight away. Clearly MOST (almost all)  wind turbine power generation cannot compete with other power generation.

But it gets worse. They want to elaborate. (Ugh!)

First off they state the bleeding obvious
[quote]
Wind cannot compete with the cost of producing electricity from an existing power plant that has already been depreciated and paid for by taxpayers or electricity consumers.
[unquote]


Uh yes I would go along with that. Unfortunately though wind will never be free of its subsidy. It needs it to survive. If you did away with the ROC all wind farms would close down over night. Consequently wind will never be able to compete on a level playing field. It will always be cash hungry and require subsidy.

Then they contradict their first statement about how competitive wind is and admit that even at "good windy sites" is is not fully competitive, opting for a half way house "increasingly competitive".

[quote]
At good windy sites, however, it is increasingly competitive with other new-build generation technologies, especially given the dramatic rise in oil and gas prices. Oil, which influences the price of gas, has increased from an average of $14 in 1998 (in real terms) to around $100 in 2008.
[unquote]

Whatever you think about fracking we do now know that in the USA gas is now trading at a 50% discount to Europe. So even the spiteful little hope of other energy source prices  rising so high they make wind competitive is history.

But that's just the start. I could go on... and on... But you would get bored as would I.

When you hear about Wind turbine carpet baggers and their brown nosing friends ranting on about "Debunking the Myths" you know that what they really mean to do is ply you with their own deceptive propaganda and half truths.

Always listen to the arguments then ask yourself what is in it for them.

With Professor Jefferson, the CPRE, the John Muir Trust, Country Guardian and many others the answer is a desire to protect countryside and the people who live there.

With our deceptive band of turbine carpet-baggers the answer is money - your money.

Anyway after that rather depressing analysis lets finish with another excellent cartoon from windtoons.com

Wind Power Today in June

I haven't visited the excellent NETA-bmreports site for a while so I thought I'd have a quick look tonight just to see how much the wind power generation has improved by since my last visit.

I hit the enter key with a great deal of excitement, would it be wonderful?

Would it be, well, at least an improvement?

After all it couldn't get much worse than my last analysis during last winter (See Here)

I waited impatiently while Firefox fired up Java. The seconds ticked away then I watched as all those wonderful little applets burst into life.

My God! NETA is undoubted one of the best and most informative sites on the net!

Here is the one I was hoping to see an improvement in:

Sadly, I was disappointed (again).

Today the whole of the wind turbine fleet was running with a capacity factor of just under 8%. But tomorrow it goes up (wait for it) to 13.5% Woo Hoo!

So today that equates to 1/4 or a single average sized power station for the whole wind turbine fleet. Tomorrow that equates to 1/3 of a average sized power station.

Now I might have incurred the wrath of those who think that the odd snapshot like this is not really indicative of the true output.

To an extent that is true.

But I would like to point out that neither is the so-called capacity factor that windies like to quote. Often blindly quoted at 30% , last year it was 22%.

But whatever the value, Capacity factor is no more worthwhile than my single snapshot.

Because of the nature of wind energy, turbines will be running for most of the time well below their capacity factor,.

They only make up for it due to a few days of high wind.

Most of the time the output of a wind turbine will be less than 20%. For  30% of the time it is less than  10%.

What we need is the most likely output not some dodgy average of power generated from a cube law.

So, are we getting value for money out of these things? Is the irreparable damage done to the countryside and peoples lives worth this pitiful level of power generation?

I think not.

p.s. I must do another 3 or 6 month rolling appraisal again soon.

European Electricity Prices Compared

Here is a price comparison table from The European Energy Portal.

We can do a little analysis of relative electricity prices in Europe.

Highest prices are in  Denmark closely followed by Germany. France is the lowest in Western Europe and Bulgaria is the lowest overall.

• The Danish pay well over twice the price for their electricity compared to the French.
• The Germans pay 190% more for electricity than the French, i.e. nearly double.
• The Italians pay 49% more for their electricity than the French
• The Spanish pay 43% more for their electricity than the French. Half as much again.
• The British pay 12% more than the French.

It is interesting to correlate these price differences to installed generation capacity.

• The Danes are the world leaders per head of population in installed wind power. They also have, by far the most expensive electricity in Europe.
• Germany has the largest European installation of wind power. It is number two is this highest priced electricity in Europe
• Spain is close on Germany's heels for installed capacity. Their prices though are a little more reasonable, they are tenth in the price league table.
• Italy comes a poor third on total installed wind capacity but like the Spanish, they cough up half as much again as the French.

What does this tell us?

Well, I think that the overriding fact is that French Nuclear power (80% of French Electricity generation is nuclear) provides by far, the cheapest electricity in Europe.

Interestingly, the French have the fourth largest number of wind turbines in Europe but like Italy (No 3) and the UK (No 5) this number is about one quarter of that in Germany and Spain.

Compared to Denmark, France (like Italy and the UK) has less than one tenth of the installed number of turbines per head of population.

It would militate that when installed wind power capacity gets above a certain percentage, the price to the consumer sky-rockets. It also shows that wind power is the inflationary driver behind electricity price hikes all across Europe. Generally the more turbines per head of population, the higher your electricity bills are. French prices are driven low by nuclear. If they dispensed with their windmills then their prices would probably be even less.

But the above table contains another really disgraceful truth.

Compare the prices for all of the above nations for a low level user (left column) and a high level user (right column).

You will find that in most countries, including Denmark, Germany, Spain, France and the UK, the high level user gets a discount. In Western Europe, only Italy and the Netherlands charge more for profligate useage.

Surely, if we are trying to cut down on energy useage, we should stop having the smaller users subsidising the higher users.

In other words, why do we have pensioners and the thrifty, subsiding the extravagance of the well-off or careless?

Is that not basic common sense that we should reward energy thift, no punish it?
---------
[Note: 27/03/2014]
 Sadly, sometime in the last few months the European Energy Portal appears to have removed the comparison tables on national electricity and gas prices. It now only publishes comparison tables on petrol/diesel/lpg. I would suspect that the freely available data has been censored as it seriously undermined EU policy. As this post is now 3 years old I hope to update it in the near future when I identify another straight-forward source of pricing information. (red rags bulls and all that)
Regards Billo
[End Note]

New Nuclear Sites Confirmed

The government has confirmed the sites for eight new nuclear reactors.

And about time too. See Fuels & Power article Here

All the political dithering and posturing over the last ten years (yes ten) has seriously compromised our ability to produce the base load electricity we will so desperately need now.

All over the country old and obsolete plant is being forced into ever longer service because there is nothing to replace it.

Inevitably old plant is less safe than new plant. For exactly the same reasons that a new Ford Mondeo is massively safer than a 1960's Ford Prefect.

But because of the political dithering and toadying to narrow minded environmental bigotry, we now can ill afford to close any of the old plant whether it is coal, gas, oil or nuclear.

Inefficient as it may be, the 50-60 year old plant has to soldier on.

Why can we not close it down anyway?

Because without it, the country's electricity supply simply could not cope.

If ten years ago we had embarked on a steady and measured programme of renewing our nuclear stock and replacing old coal plants with Generation IV nuclear plant, today we would perhaps (like the French) have the lowest electricity prices in Europe, and also the lowest electricity generation CO2 emissions.

Along with that we would have no dirty coal plant and our dependancy on foreign gas would be diminished. As we currently have "in stock" about 60 - 80 years worth of nuclear fuel just sitting on the shelf, we would also be self sufficient in energy.

But it is no use crying over spilt milk.

What we need to do now is to get those in high office to understand the need for much more new Generation IV nuclear plant. France has 58 nuclear reactors with another 3 in various stages of build.

The French have shown that Nuclear works and is highly cost effective. Their huge success lays bare the lies and propaganda about "subsidised nuclear".

If nuclear is so "subsidised" how come the French (80 % nuclear) have the cheapest electricity in Europe?

How come in windmill ridden  Denmark electricity bills are among the highest?

We don't just need eight new Generation IV reactors, we need to start with at least twice that number.

But that is just a start.

I suppose a confirmation about eight new reactors is better than yet more dithering.

But it is still a long way from what we really need.

The Cost Of Generating Electricity

If you want to read a dry document look no further than the "The Cost of Generating Electricity" from the Royal Academy of Engineering. But to describe this document as dry is very far from an insult. It does exactly what it says on the tin (or header page). It makes no blatent partisan statements. It is a terse brutally scientific appraisal of the costs of generating electricity by different methods of generation.

It includes as optional extras the bits that some wish to miss out.

take this graph:

There are also two caveats attached to the graph. These are:

[quote]

1 With the exception of nuclear, the analysis assumes that decommissioning is cost neutral. The capital cost estimate for nuclear plant includes an allowance for the costs of decommissioning.
2 For the purpose of this study, wave and marine technologies are deemed to be predictable and therefore have not been burdened with the additional cost of standby generation.

[unquote]

So Nuclear including decommisioning costs less per MW than any other generation method other than CCGT (Combined Cycle Gas Turbine) and is less than one third of the cost of offshore wind generation and well under half the cost of on shore wind generation. Even if you exclude the extra spinning reserve needed by wind, nuclear is still massively cheaper.

But pure cost is not the only issue. One item constantly raised by pro-windies is energy security, so lets have a look at a graph concerning a price variation of +/- 20% on each energy fuel.

So because nuclear uses so little fuel, the cost of the fuel is not far off immaterial. Also all nuclear fuel can either be created from existing stocks (85 years worth) and at worst purchased from the massive ore supplies in secure countries like Australia. With nuclear there is no risk to fuel supply.

The final argument bleated out by proponents of wind concerns CO2 emissions. Look at this:

Clearly the cheapest and least polluting technology is Nuclear. In fact just about everything , even with carbon mitigation is more cost effective than wind.

So why are we continuing to ruin our countryside with these monstrous, ineffective and massively expensive wind turbines?

All answers please to Billothewisp, written on a clean £50.00 note.Please mark all bank notes "ROC subsidy"

Wind Power, Asbestos and Tobacco

Asbestos is a natural substance. It has been used since antiquity. Believe it or not, the Vestal Virgins in ancient Rome used Asbestos fibres in their lamps. As you know, it was heavily used as a building material 19th and 20th centuries . Initially, it was regarded as benign and was used extensively around the world.

But in the 1920's an epidemiological link was established between Asbestos and illness.

Instead of doing the decent thing and helping the medics with their research, the Asbestos companies formed a cartel to defend their markets from regulation. For the next 50 years they fought an effective rear guard action to block legislation..

The discovery of the health consequences of smoking were concurrent with that of Asbestos. Yet, like the Asbestos industry, the tobacco industry sought to block restrictions on their trade. People who called for regulation were pilloried as anti-social eccentrics, out of touch with modern society.  The vilification the tobacco industry poured on its detractors often succeeded in ruining careers.

So how does this relate to Wind Turbines?

Today, there are growing concerns about the the health effects of forcing people to live too close to wind turbines. Research studies has been produced that suggest that people are being made ill by this close proximity. The credentials of the researchers are impeccable. Regrettably the response for the wind turbine industry and their supporters ( with One notable and honourable exception) is almost identical to the methodology of obfuscation, character assasination and denial presented by the Asbestos and Tobacco industries before them.

The real irony here is that the mitigation being proposed by the researchers and medics ( as well as bodies such as the French equivalent of the BMA) is trivially simple.

Do not build wind turbines within 1 mile of Human habitation.

Simple.

I don't believe wind turbines are effective or reliable. But those arguments are one wholly different level to the risk of causing harm to people who live too close to these wind farms.

We need a full epidemiological survey to be done before we risk making this problem worse. Either the Wind Industry should build no more turbines within 1 mile of human habitation or at the very least let us get a full epidemiological survey before proceeding.

Any industry or group that puts their profits and ideology before the health of the general public deserve our utter contempt

How ever green they claim to be.

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.