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2003 Jun, Newsletter No.59 |
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Written by SONE
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Monday, 02 June 2003 |
BOTCH-UP AND RISK
On the face of it, getting rid of the LordChancellor and securing
Britain’s energy supplieshave nothing in common. Yet the
astonishingincompetence with which the Prime Ministersought to ditch
1,998 years of history withoutconsultation only to find that the Lords
could notmeet without a Lord Chancellor on the Woolsackis highly
relevant to nuclear power.
If
a Government can get such a simple matter offact wrong – and
embarrassed Civil Servants areup in arms over what they describe as
the“shambolic reshuffle” – then it can get anythingwrong – and not
least energy policy.
Whatever the symbolism of the Lord Chancellor,we could no doubt
manage perfectly well withoutone for some time at least. But we
cannotmanage without energy and especially electricity.Yet while most
of the British public are awarethat the latest reshuffle and re-shaping
of theGovernment went horribly wrong, they areblissfully unaware of the
risks Britain is nowrunning with its electricity supplies.
Those risks grow no less with the passage of timeand National Grid
Transco is the latest to voiceconcern. There are, as was recognised at
theSellafield general meeting in April, dangers inSONE repeatedly
crying wolf. But we don’t needto do so. All we need to do is to make
thefollowing points:1 - last winter we came within an ace ofelectricity
cuts and this winter the safety marginwill be significantly smaller.2 -
demand now exceeds domestic gas suppliesand more and more gas of
uncertain price willhave to be imported; the industry thinks the2005-6
winter will be especially tricky formeeting demand.3 - this is what
comes of relying on a wing and aprayer – wind power and energy
conservation –instead of the certainty of nuclear power, the
onlypractical way of powering Britain and making ourcontribution to
cutting greenhouse gas emissions.4 - we in SONE know that the reshuffle
was notthe only botch-up; so was the Energy WhitePaper (EWP). Britain’s
economy – and your job– are now at risk.
THE GREENEST OF GREEN
The departure in the reshuffle of the fiercely
anti-nuclearEnvironment Minister, Michael Meacher,also provides the
opportunity to make one othertelling point. Mr Meacher was described by
TheGuardian, in recording his political obituary, as a“Green”
enthusiast.
Yet how can anyone be described as “Green”who opposes the only
means by which Britain’spower supplies can be ensured while at the
sametime cleaning up the atmosphere? “Green” isclearly a relative term
when it encompasses thosewho would wreck the countryside and coast
withuseless and expensive wind farms. The “Greenestof the Green” are
those who would develop ournuclear power industry. By comparison, the
restlook unhealthily yellow.
We regret the departure in the reshuffle of BrianWilson, Energy
Minister. He was genuinely pro-nuclear,however presentationally
besotted withrenewables. But he clearly lost out in theformulation of
what passes for an energy policy.
The DTI says his successor is Stephen TimmsMP for East Ham. Elliot
Morley MP forScunthorpe, is the new Environment Minister. MrTimms has
Ministerial experience in theDepartments of Social Security, Treasury
andEducation. His expertise is in IT andtelecommunications. His
connection with energy,like that of Mr Morley, is not recorded.
MrMorley, a Minister in DEFRA since 1997, issteeped in the countryside
and interested inwildlife and especially bird life.
Meanwhile, we can only reflect on the politicalinstability in
energy. Before Mr Wilsondisappeared, Crispin Blunt, the Tory
energyspokesman, chose to resign in protest at IainDuncan Smith’s party
leadership as the localelection polls closed in May only to discover
hisparty had made 561 gains.
POWER COMPETITION FAILING
Having rendered electricity generationuneconomic and brought the
prospect of powercuts, Callum McCarthy, chief executive ofOfgem, the
energy regulator, is off to run theFinancial Services Agency, the City
regulator.The Square Mile should be warned.
As he goes, the electricity market – wholesaleand retail – is a
shambles. It’s not just NationalGrid Transco warning of power cuts next
winter.The National Audit Office, which monitorspublic spending, has
expressed concern that littleof the 40% fall in wholesale prices of
electricitysince 1998 has been passed on to customers bysuppliers.
Even Mr McCarthy admits that 63% ofcustomers at the end of March
were still withtheir original electricity and gas supplier – fiveyears
after competition was introduced into gasand four years since consumer
choice began tooperate in electricity. Yet he still deniescompetition
is failing, even though Energywatchcomplains that companies are making
it toodifficult for customers to switch suppliers and themarket is
plagued by billing and transfer processerrors and mis-selling.
Mr McCarthy once dismissively told yourSecretary that he should
shop around for cheaperelectricity. “You wouldn’t want to see a
singleprice for tomatoes, would you”, he asked. Notnecessarily, we told
the theoretician. But MrsBloggs, of Wigan Pier, could examine and
feeland compare tomatoes. She hadn’t a clue whatshe was being urged to
buy by high pressure energysalesmen who rang her up while she was
watchingCoronation Street. Why should she buy a pig in apoke? Mr
McCarthy should get real – and quick.
OBITUARY
We regret to record the deaths of three members:John N Bartlam
(Waterlooville), Dr D H Peirson(Abingdon) and Sir Michael
Richardson(London). We were honoured to have their support.
THE HYDROGEN ECONOMY
Over recent weeks members have shown aconsiderable interest in the
development of ahydrogen economy. John Ritch, DirectorGeneral of the
World Nuclear Association,gave an upbeat paper on it to a
BritishNuclear Society conference in Manchester onJune 19. Paul Spare,
a Davenham (Cheshire)member, also co-wrote an article on it in theApril
issue of Energy World, journal of theInstitute of Energy. We summarise
theircontributions below.
The clean energy vision
John Ritch began by urging the British nuclearindustry to be confident.
He said it currentlylabours under economic duress that deriveslargely
from government policy and underpolitical duress that derives largely
from theabsence of government policy.
“In a national culture where unexamined anddeeply entrenched
anti-nuclearism habituallyparades itself as high morality”, he said
“theBritish Government has been just brave andvisionary enough to
enunciate admirable goalsfor clean energy. And just timid and
shortsightedenough to shy away from any seriousproclamation as to how
those goals mightrealistically be met”.
Yet he believed the nuclear industry’s destiny wassuccess. The
world was at a watershed with acompelling need to produce clean energy
on amassive global scale. This broad recognitionwould occur more
quickly than many nowimagined and would be accelerated by thedawning of
the hydrogen economy.
The implications for nuclear were immense bothpolitically and
economically. The projected needfor primary energy to make hydrogen in
thecoming decades now matched or exceeded thosefor the generation of
electricity. He had alsofound an extremely receptive audience at
theWorld Hydrogen Conference in Vancouver,attended by 1,000 delegates,
on the hydrogen-nuclearnexus and the common interest of the
twotechnologies in fostering and accelerating publicrecognition of
their joint potential.
Either we would achieve a radical transformationof the global
economy or a radical upsurge inhuman suffering and a radical alteration
of theglobal environment. Those who persisted inopposing nuclear power
in the name ofenvironmental preservation would surely earn thescorn of
history and of future generations.
Hydrogen, by its ability to store enormousquantities of electricity
for use on demand incleanly powered transport or the full range
oftraditional electricity uses in home and industry,provided the bridge
by which nuclear powercould contribute not just base-load electricity
butalso to the entire spectrum of energy use. This, hesaid, was the
clean energy vision for the future.
Implications of hydrogen future
Paul Spare, in an article written with Dr AlistairMiller (Atomic
Energy of Canada), says that ifwe were to replace the 76m tonnes of
oilcurrently used in Britain, we would need 30mtonnes of hydrogen,
allowing for its highercalorific value. This would require a vast
increasein hydrogen production, many thousand timescurrent output and
present a major challenge interms of planning, capital
investment,construction and the environment.
To propel 25% of the nation’s light vehicle fleetby fuel cells by
2020 would require slightly lessthan the output of five Sizewell B
reactors ortwice as many – ie requiring the construction ofone a year –
if 75% of the fleet were to beconverted by 2030. This would avoid
theproduction of 4.7m tonnes of carbon by 2020and 14.1mt in 2030.
There were two options for producing thehydrogen – in a number of
regional electrolysisplants or in local plants. The former would bemore
expensive because it would need a newdistribution system. If hydrogen
productionoccurred during off-peak under-use of the grid,there was
likely to be little difficulty indistributing the electricity required
up to 2020,but it would be more problematical by 2030.
Mr Spare also looked at using renewable energysources – wind, wood,
wave and solar. He foundthat while they might make small
contributions,the scope of the change required large non-fossil– ie
nuclear – plants to be successful.
GREENS THINK SMALL
Professor James Lovelock CH, a SONE patron,in an interview in April
with Joan Bakewell onBBC Radio 3, outlined his concerns about
the“Green” movement. He said:
“The problem with the green movement, as I seeit, is that it is
mainly concerned with ‘peopleproblems’. They will worry about
nuclearradiation, about pesticides, about poisons and soon. But they
worry far less about damage to theearth. In fact, it was only recently
that the greenmovement even began to take on board thegreenhouse
problem.
“I see it, as an earth scientist, almost from theopposite
viewpoint. It’s the earth’s problems thatare really crucial, not only
for the earth but forthe people. If pesticides were unregulated, if
weall had nuclear power stations everywhere in theworld to the extent
that the French do, I think thatwould be a minor problem compared with
globalgreenhouse”.
Asked about the future of his Gaia Theory whichsees the Earth as a
single living organism, hesaid: “The planet itself is quite old. It
existedwith life on it 4m years but we’re pretty certainshe won’t have
more than 1m years to go. So inhuman terms four fifths of her life has
gone andif she were good for a hundred, she must be 80.In other words,
she’s about my age – an age, Ithink, where she should be treated with
care andrespect”.
How about a SONE slogan: “If you care aboutMother Earth, go nuclear”?
WEST CUMBRIA’S ENERGY WISE
If there is a single part of this country where thereis a more open
debate about energy than in WestCumbria, we would like to hear of it.
Theirdebate finds its focus in the Whitehaven News towhich SONE members
are regular contributors.They don’t allow an anti-nuclear argument
topass them by and they are particularly hot onputting renewables in
their small corner.
In one recent letters page in the Whitehaven Newswe found letters
from four SONE members whoregularly feature in its lively energy debate
– DrPeter Wilson, Jim Jones, Roy Sumerling and A DEvans. We thank them
for looking after thenuclear interest.
SONE PENETRATES THE TIMES
SONE members are also doing well in TheTimes. Robert Freer (London)
followed up onJune 12 an earlier success (which Andrew
Harris,Droitwich, also had) by seizing on National GridTransco’s
warning of power cuts next winter.
The problem, he said, had been caused by theGovernment’s short
sighted policy of drivingdown the wholesale price of electricity and
itsobsession with trying to pretend that windmillswould provide us with
a major source of reliableand economic power.
“When the power cuts affect Westminster andMPs are reduced to
holding debates in Parliamentby candlelight”, he added “perhaps it will
thinkagain” – again, that is, about the expert advice theGovernment had
ignored in producing the EWP.
Alan Shaw, a Norfolk member, scored anothersuccess when he backed
up Mr Freer with apublished letter. He wrote: “The
Government’sidealistic policies for renewable energy, whichapparently
continue to disregard objectiveengineering opinion, will subject the UK
toelectricity shortages and blackouts sooner than itor the public
realise. The lead time necessary toput right the situation with a new
UK nuclearpower programme has already virtuallydisappeared”.
BBC AT IT AGAIN
Your Secretary has written to Richard Sambrook,BBC Director of
News, following his assurancein July 2001 that editors and
correspondents hadbeen notified of the UN official death toll
atChernobyl – ie 45.
He has done so since E G Harling, a TunbridgeWells member, received
a “weasel-worded” letterfrom BBC Information in response to
hiscomplaint that a presenter on its “FarmingToday” programme said the
disaster killedhundreds of people. It seems the BBC’s reminderto its
staff about the facts needs to be reinforced.
BRIAN WILSON ON WARPATH
Let it never be said that this Newsletter ischurlish about
recognising courageous championsof nuclear. We wish to record one of
formerEnergy Minister, Brian Wilson’s valedictoryinterviews in which he
attacked the “bombast” ofenvironmentalists and the “long procession
ofunfounded scare stories” about Sellafield.
He was speaking in Dublin after a meeting withthe Irish Environment
Minister, Paul Cullen whono doubt found that Mr Wilson’s cap fitted
himuncomfortably well.
“Of course the debate in Ireland is not entirelyhonest”, Mr Wilson
told the Irish Times. “I havea kid with Down’s Syndrome. I hate to hear
kidswith Down’s Syndrome being used as politicalpawns. When I hear
bogus claims about Down’sSyndrome clusters [along the Irish Sea coast],
Ireach for the sick bag. It should be possible tohave a rational debate
about a genuine andsensitive and difficult issue without resorting
tofalsehoods and highly emotive claims”.
Mr Wilson said he understood that the Irishpeople were never going
to “love” Sellafield, butit would be much healthier if there could be
adialogue and understanding based on facts andshared information than
“a long procession ofunfounded scare stories”.
The Irish Government is mounting anotherchallenge in the courts to Sellafield.
NUCLEAR GROWS ...
Next time anti-nukes say the nuclear industry isdying on its feet, you can riposte as follows:
The International Atomic Energy Agency has justreported that across
the world six new reactors,representing 5000MW, were connected to
thegrid in 2002 – four in China and one each in theCzech Republic and
South Korea. Four were shutdown – two each in the UK and Bulgaria.
Sonuclear ended the year with a net gain.
More important, 32 new reactors were underconstruction last year.
John Ritch pointed out inhis Manchester lecture that nuclear power
hasbeen the fastest growing major energy source inthe world for four
consecutive decades. Theargument now is not whether it will grow buthow
fast.
... NUCLEAR SAVES
Dr Feroze Duggan, a member of the Institute ofPhysics’ energy
management group with abackground in nuclear waste research, told
anInstitute conference on May 28 that the price ofelectricity in France
is two-thirds the UK’s.
France is about 80% nuclear powered and hassaved about £1bn a year
by going nuclear. Theconference was organised by Terry Jackson,
aBelfast member of SONE.
We are asked to inform you that Nuclear Issues istaking a break this month. It will be back in July.
Published by:
Supporters of Nuclear Energy, c/o BNES, 7 Great George Street, PO Box 25124, London SW1P 3ZS.
Tel: 020-7665-2046, Fax: 020-7665-2269
Web site: www.sone.org.uk |
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Last Updated ( Thursday, 11 January 2007 )
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