After the recent eye-watering increases in gas (and electricity) prices, The Economist is telling us that the situation is going to get even worse.

Britain’s gas market, it says, is changing fundamentally in ways that make it much more vulnerable to higher gas prices. As domestic supplies dwindle, Britain must make up the shortfall from overseas, either through pipelines from Europe or by buying shipfuls of liquefied natural gas (LNG) on the global market. Currently, North Sea production can supply around two-thirds of Britain's maximum demand; that will fall to around half as soon as 2010.

View full article here

So if we built enough Nuclear now then we could reduce our gas load and become gas independent again?

That's about the size of it ... but the longer investment in nuclear is delayed, the more it is going to cost us.

Do you happen to know if it would be possible to build new next-gen reactor buildings on existing sites, thus side-stepping planning blox? I think what I'm saying is if someone with a Backbone looked the Sir Humphreys in the eye and said "Action today!" how quickly would be practicable and would it stop the lights going out?
I am aware there is no backbone in the Bubble.

Whlst this is going on, the pinheads in the trade union movement and Labour back benches seem to think our troubles can be solved by a windfall tax on the greedy energy companies, just the thing to persuade them to invest billions in the UK. Face it people, we are ruled by morons.

It would take far too long to build Nuclear... the lights would be out for a good 5 years...

The expertise to build them is in such demand and our foreign relations so bad I would assume we will be even lower on the priorities list...

Why will they rush in building our reactors (reminds the government just sold our only in house manufacturer...) when they are selling us gas at inflated prices...?

Notice the Germans are negotiating sole distribution rights for Russian Gas and he yanks have sold theirs to China...

I think we need to go Wave powered real soon, or become slaves.

Britania rule the waves!

Looks more like the waves will rule Britannia! More realistically, we end up building more gas-powered stations, because they are all we can build in a hurry, and then end up paying through the nose for gas on the spot market. Demand will be curtailed drastically because people will be less able to afford the electricty that is generated.

Shite and onions, was it not Pascal who observed that attempts to create paradise on earth invariably lead to hell? Government's job is to make purgatory bearable, not make it worse. The mess the politechnocracy usually makes is what's known as the human comedy. Only sometimes, unlike Jumping Jack Flash, it's not a gas, gas, gas.

Coal. We have plenty of it. Let's use it. And make it very clear to Brussels that we WILL NOT be de-commissioning any coal-fired power stations because of any of their 'carbon directives'. If we do not have a sufficient and reliable energy supply, we will enter a new dark age.

The only thing our politicians are likely to do is make the problem worse.

http://eureferendum.blogspot.com/2008/0 ... oblem.html

Slaves it is then...

And thus our dilemma of choice:
be screwed by AmeriKKKa,
be screwed even more by Yurp in Brussels,
be screwed and drink vodka-ice Russia,
be screwed long distance by Ch-Ch-Ch-China,
or just carry on pretending we can throw our weight around...

...or

...we could get screwed by those lovely French Italian Fascists at the MU and help them provoke a civil war in Spain...

...after all the Neo-cons love 'em, don't they...

Its like 1908 all over again.

As we know, the carbon footprint scam cannot be sustained and is totally unnecessary, because CO2 is a fertilizer and NOT- NOT- NOT a pollutant. Thus, coal fired power stations should be our salvation. Of course there is the small matter of our politicians and the EU, but if the darkness were to come, could any politician trust the security services to keep them safe during the night?

Reportedly, reactors for submarines (and ships?) can be built in a factory and run in parallel, as computer servers are. I have lost the link.

You've certainly given me cause for concern with that one.

WTF are you?

When the lights go out they will find it easy to blame the EU to try and save their own skin.