EVENTS, DEAR BOY, RE-INFORCE THE URGENT NEED FOR NUCLEAR Security of
supply – the real justification for a new nuclear power station
programme – is deteriorating in spite of more hopeful noises about
supplies this coming winter. Events in the Far East, the Middle East
and the energy market have combined to worsen the situation since the
Government’s Energy Review was published in July.
Once again the nationalistic Mr Putin is disturbing the world. His interference with the Shell/ Japanese contract to develop the Sakhalin oilfield in the Far East underlines his determination to re-build Russia’s political power on its energy resources and, if necessary, to overturn commercial agreements. Excessive reliance for gas on such a source seems rather like putting one’s head in the Great Bear’s mouth.
In the Middle East, concerns about Iran’s nuclear weapons ambitions grow no less, though France, of course, will have no talk of sanctions against the country if it does not heed the UN. Hezbollah claims victory over Israel with a demonstration reputedly attended by an eighth of Lebanon’s population and Hamas, on behalf of Palestinians, refuses to acknowledge Israel’s right to exist. Stability is not made of this mosaic of troubles.
In spite of these uncertainties, the price of oil and gas has eased, virtually bankrupting a hedge fund that gambled on gas prices rising while commodity prices fell. But cheaper prices, while welcome to consumers, if they result, will probably mean more consumption, thereby exacerbating any shortages in Britain.
The National Grid/Ofgem encouraging gas supply outlook is more optimistic about the second half of the winter than the first because more gas is expected to flow later rather than sooner through new pipelines from the Continent. This assumes, of course, the now customary mild winter and that Continental monopolies are less protectionist than they were in cold snaps last winter.
If the truth is told, we are once again flying on a wing and a prayer, with only 40% - i.e. the amount generated by gas - of the electricity supply picture so far revealed. We do not know how the power station plant margin is shaping up, though it has not been helped by cracks in boilers putting two nuclear power stations out of action.
Events, dear boy, as Mr Macmillan put it, thus re-inforce why SONE, in its response to the Government’s energy review, emphasises the need for urgency over a new nuclear power station programme. Nuclear may offer no solution to immediate supply problems but it does promise greater security of electricity supply longer term and less use of fossil fuels. We remain impatient.
SONE RESPONSES PUBLISHED
SONE’s replies to the Government’s and the Conservatives’ energy reviews have been published on the SONE website (www.sone.org.uk) and hard copies can be obtained from the Secretary on 020-8660-8970.
Government
In response to the Government’s review we welcome it as a major improvement on the 2003 Energy White Paper. By including nuclear, it provides a much more realistic approach to the energy needs of the nation. We acknowledge its acceptance of SONE’s arguments on nuclear economics, nuclear’s contribution to carbon reduction, energy diversity, security of electricity supply, and on its safety and security in relation to terrorism and proliferation and on the availability of uranium fuel.
The Government, we say, is now alone in Britain’s political spectrum in providing a basis for a responsible approach to equipping the nation with the energy policy it desperately needs, and we pledge our support to that end.
But we say we shall judge the Government’s new approach – and the White Paper promised by the end of the year – by the measures it takes now and in the near future to facilitate – as distinct from subsidise – the development of nuclear power. This is because our main reservation about the review is its lack of urgency.
Conservatives
We describe the Conservatives’ energy review as an “inadequate and worrying” response for three reasons: 1 – it fails to recognise the prime objective of energy policy should be security of supply at competitive cost; 2 – it takes immense risks in “giving green energy a chance” (while excluding the greenest, nuclear); 3 – it is fundamentally wrong-headed in making nuclear “a last resort” when Britain faces closure, through age or environmental reasons, of a third of its generating capacity over the next 15-20 years.
It is, we say, an irresponsible approach – and all the more irresponsible for differing little in substance from the Government’s failed White Paper of 2003.
We – impatiently – await signs that both Government and Conservative Opposition have responded to our criticisms.
“INEXPLICABLY CONFIDENT”
In a personal commentary on the Conservatives’ review, sent to his MP, Paul Spare, an engineermember of SONE’s committee, takes the outcome “severely” to task on several counts.
One of them – on renewables – reflects a widespread concern in SONE. “Without any evidence”, Mr Spare writes, “the review is inexplicably confident that some miraculous new renewable, wonder power will emerge to solve our problems. It is simply not credible that after almost 40 years of study by scientists in the UK and a variety of other advanced industrial nations, that any significant renewable power source remains undiscovered.” Another is carbon capture and storage which, he says, is dealt with in “a very shallow manner”.
He writes: “Carbon capture from large coal-fired plants is seen as a panacea that will redress our increasing CO2 output, but the practical problems are massively challenging.
“The CO2 production from the power sector will soon reach 200m tonnes a year – apparently to be disposed of under the North Sea, transported using sea-going tankers. With a capacity of 20,000 tonnes each, it will necessitate 10,000 ship movements per year or about 40 a working day, allowing for bad weather. Maximum CO2 production occurs in the middle of winter to meet peak electricity demand when disposal of the waste will be most dangerous. Is it really credible that such a shuttle service could be either organised or afforded by electricity consumers?”.
Mr Spare ends with a cry repeatedly heard in SONE: “There is little evidence that any advice has been sought from the engineers and technologists who manage these industries with assets of £100bn who will have to develop the solutions”.
THE COST OF RENEWABLES
Two SONE members have raised the cost of renewables. Robert Freer, an engineer member of SONE’s committee, writing in the summer issue of Science in Parliament, says it seems that the price of carbon reduction, by relying on wind energy, is “an order of magnitude” higher than the commercially-traded rate in Europe.
The cost has been put at £30bn by 2020 – a figure quoted by Sir Donald Miller, former chairman of Scottish Power, at an inquiry into a proposed wind farm at Greenock. He said that figure was larger than the UK’s education budget and more than half the money available for the NHS.
“No wonder wind farm development has been linked to subsidy farming”, he said. “It is surely time the electricity customer was made aware of these massive subsidies which are being awarded to wind developers in his name”.
DUTCH PULL PLUG
It would be interesting to know whether the Dutch Government has taken Mr Freer’s and Sir Donald’s concerns to heart. Whether or not, it has decided to freeze subsidies for new renewable energy projects from August. The official reason is that subsidies, introduced in 2003, have raised Dutch renewable electricity production to the European target of nine per cent (from 4.3 per cent in 2004) and that the Netherlands has thus done its bit for now. The cost of the scheme is also thought to have played a part.
Other international concerns about renewables ccme from Germany and Denmark. Deutsche- Energie Argentur, in a report sponsored by the German Government and power industry, said that while wind power capacity would reach 48GW by 2020, the source was so intermittent and unreliable that it was equivalent to only 2GW of stable fossil fuel capacity.
A Danish report on the mismatch between supply and demand, said wind accounted for 20 per cent of electricity production in 2004 but supplied only six per cent of consumption. Some 84 per cent of Danish wind-generated electricity was exported to Norway and sold at a loss for Denmark.
IS IT PRACTICAL?
Alan Shaw, a Norfolk member and retired chartered engineer, has written to Alistair Darling, Industry Secretary, calling for a moratorium on wind turbines on roofs – as planned, for example, by David Cameron, the Tory leader, for his own home – pending tests.
He says that changes in housebuilding techniques over recent years have led to mass “materials saving” methods of production for roof construction, coupled with the absence of loadbearing interior walls.
“To super-impose on such a roof structure a wind turbine of quite modest output”, he says, “introduces intermittent dynamic stresses and vibrations which would cause a qualified and experienced engineer to pre-examine the integrity of the roof truss joints before accepting installation of any wind turbine of any size whatever. I trust you will announce a moratorium on any such schemes until several experimental houses have been tested to destruction in various parts of the country at government expense”.
SONE’s RENEWABLES CRITERIA
After all this, we wish to make SONE’s position clear about the exploitation of renewables. We did so in our response to the Government’s energy review. The relevant passage states: “We recognise that new or developments of old technologies might require encouragement but we would argue that inclusion in any scheme of incentives should be based on a rigorous assessment of the likelihood of the source meeting the four criteria rehearsed above [for nuclear] – safe, reliable, clean and with a reasonable chance of becoming competitive within a measurable period of time.
“As a step, we hope, in that direction, we welcome the idea of graduated support or “banding” since it is now clear beyond peradventure – as Parliamentary inquiries and debates have revealed – that wind power, after at least 15years’ development, is a vastly expensive and ineffective source of power and carbon reduction”.
LOVELOCK ON BIOFUEL
The Sun newspaper has gone green but not antinuclear and has given a SONE patron, Professor James Lovelock, the floor to welcome the Government’s embracing nuclear power. He used the opportunity to put the oil industry and its current passion for promoting biofuels and wind power in its place.
Critically examining the oil companies’ motives, Professor Lovelock said: “I wonder if it is because they are energy companies and know that their only rival is nuclear energy. There will never be nuclear-powered cars or aircraft. But already the trains in France run almost entirely on nuclear energy…and maybe the oil companies fear the time when your car will run on batteries charged from nuclear electricity….
“The one renewable energy they will use is biofuel which is diesel made from crops. This fuel is heavily subsidised by you and me in taxes and will be a nice little earner for the oil companies while it lasts. Far from being green, biofuel is the most environmentally destructive of all energy sources.
“Huge areas of land would be needed to grow the biofuel and it can only be taken at the expense of land for food crops and land for natural forests that keep the air clean and breathable. I am therefore very glad that our Government has had the sense to see that nuclear energy is the best way for us to have inexpensive and reliable electricity and help save the planet, too.”
GREEN IS THE PASSWORD
As we write, the Liberal Democrats have perhaps set the tone for the party conference season with a redistributive tax package attacking wealth and what is described as “pollution” – ie carbon. It remains to be seen what is left of their rural vote after some fierce proposals to discourage gas guzzling vehicles. At Labour’s conference Gordon Brown felt obliged to go “green” to compete with David Cameron’s party pitch at the beginning of October.
All this would be reassuring if any of the parties had the courage to advocate outright and upfront the greenest form of electricity generation – i.e.
nuclear. Up to now, nuclear remains the clean, green fuel that hardly dare speak its name from a conference platform.
For example, David Miliband, Environment Minister, was headlined as telling the TUC that “nuclear power is an ‘environmental requirement’”. But when we examined the text we found all he said was that if, after investment in renewables, carbon capture and energy efficiency, the UK faced a choice between nuclear power and oil or gas “then the environmental requirement is to choose nuclear”.
By which time, it would be far too late. The lights would be out or we wouldn’t be able to afford to put them on and, if we could, greenhouse gas emissions would be soaring.
The politically divisive nature of nuclear was underlined by Charles Clarke, ex-Home Secretary, who, in pre-conference power play, went both green and anti-nuclear. This is, of course, a contradiction in terms but SONE’s problem is that most politicians don’t seem to be able to recognise it.
AND NOW THE GOOD NEWS
We are conscious this Newsletter is not so far a ray of sunshine. But there have been breaks in the clouds. For example, Bill Coley, chief executive of British Energy, reiterated at this month’s European Nuclear Power Debate in London that financial subsidies are not needed for the launch of a new nuclear power station programme.
“We first need a rational permit, planning and licensing programme to be set out by the Government”, he said, “and then I think we can compete with any other technology”.
He hoped the Energy Review would remove uncertainties but to be ready for any nuclear revival the UK needed a new generation of nuclear workers over and above BE’s 5,600 staff of long experience – “a big asset”.
The US President called on his nation to work harder to break its dependence on foreign oil and in the process gave a fresh push to nuclear power.
On Labor Day, he said: “Dependence on foreign oil jeopardizes our ability to grow. Problem is, we get oil from some parts of the world and they simply don’t like us. The more dependent we are on that type of energy, the less likely it is that we are able to compete so people can have good paying jobs.
“Nuclear power is safe and nuclear power is clean and nuclear power is renewable” , he added.
And from the IAEA this month came a public opinion poll of 18,000 people across 18 countries showing that 62 per cent support the continued use of nuclear power plants. When told that nuclear power emitted next to no greenhouse gases, those in favour of expanding nuclear power rose from 28 to 38 per cent and those opposing it fell from 59 to 47 per cent.
We have a lot of work to do yet.
GREEN CONSISTENCY
In a letter to the Sunday Telegraph, B G Owen, former GMB convenor at Sellafield, notes David Cameron has lined up with friends of the Earth to call for legislation to reduce carbon emissions.
“Is this”, he asks, “the same FoE that in the 1970s and ‘80s campaigned against the use of low-carbon hydro and nuclear power, and wanted them replaced with high-carbon coal, oil and gas?”
ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING
We hope you will be able to attend SONE’s AGM which is to be addressed by the Minister for Energy, Malcolm Wicks. It is to be held, courtesy the Nuclear Industry Association, at the Royal Academy of Engineering, 29 Great Peter Street, SW1 on Tuesday, October 24 – 12noon to 3pm.
Coffee will be available from 11.30. The AGM will be held at 12noon and the Minister will speak at 12.15 before a buffet lunch at 1.30pm. In the afternoon, Professor Michael Laughton, of the University of London, will give us an engineer’s view of energy policy.
For catering and security purposes, would members please inform the Secretary as soon as possible whether or not they will be present on T 0208-660-8970; or M 07860-535962; or by e-mail –
