Posted by Sohail Azad
On 04:59
Britain's efforts to leave the EU are a bit like trying to build nuclear power stations, that is it takes a lot longer than you expect, you're not quite sure it will actually happen and it is very expensive.Of course we have to decide what Brexit actually means. Whatever the status of the 'have our cake and eat it' notes may be as reported in The Times this morning, this will be viewed as fantasy by many except if you take the Daily Mail very seriously. Leaving the EU could actually be much...
Posted by Sohail Azad
On 02:55
The election of Donald Trump probably means that, one way or another, the USA will pull out of the Paris Agreement on climate change, but this may make less difference to how much carbon the world would have emitted than what you might think.For a start the Paris Agreement already has enough national states as signatures representing a high enough proportion of global greenhouse gas emissions to remain valid with a US withdrawal. The Agreement requires there to be signatories representing...
Posted by Sohail Azad
On 02:37
Some time before the EU referendum I predicted that a 'leave' vote would make UKIP the largest party. Well, I am very sad to admit that I was absolutely right. It's just that the Conservative Party has morphed into UKIP-lite.My argument ran that as it became obvious that the UK could not simultaneously remain in the EU's Single Market for economic purposes and have solely British control over immigration rules then support would shift to UKIP and the Tories would split. What has happened is that...
Posted by Sohail Azad
On 04:19
Peter Lilley, the ex-Tory cabinet minister, gave an unexpected boost to social science research when he implied that social science research was needed to estimate the impact of an administrative change he brought in when he was a minister in the 1990s. But what this (surprising?) boost does illustrate is that there is some hope to defend social science research from what I hear as the increasing howls of 'what's the point of all this' that I hear these days. This is especially strong after the...
Posted by Sohail Azad
On 09:31
In pursuit of a complete failure to understand the problems with its own 'capacity market' Ofgem seems about to make things a whole lot worse by reducing capacity margins - by taking away the incentives to a lot of small scale generators whose existence helps to keep the electricity sector running.Ofgem runs on a piece of fantasy theory that the capacity market will work better if the 'distorting' benefits to so-called 'embedded;' generators are taken away. In fact the opposite it the case. Ofgem's...
Posted by Sohail Azad
On 02:14
The Green Party and Jonathon Porritt have been organising campaigns to unite people to form a 'Progressive Alliance' that would co-ordinate efforts to defeat the Conservatives. There is hardly an area for which this is not more necessary than green energy. That means renewable energy and energy conservation.Tories who oppose support for renewable energy are getting their way despite the fact that green energy is much more popular than nuclear power or fracking which is their preferred means of deriving...
Posted by Sohail Azad
On 04:55
�The newest windfarm in Aberdeenshire � a good omen for renewable energy?�Roger McMichael from the company ENGIE who are building the Cairnborrow windfarm in north west Aberdeenshire will be coming along to talk on Friday September 16th at noon in room New Kings (NK) 3 at the Kings College, University of Aberdeen. He will talk about renewable energy policy as well as the windfarm that is currently under construction. You can see some details of the...
Posted by Sohail Azad
On 04:18
EDF leaders are now in such a state of panic over their Hinkley C proposals that desperate messages were being sent out to tell the British Government that they need to take a �6 billion equity share in the proposal. Signals are coming from Downing Street that the Government wants to decouple Hinkley C from the 'deal' with China allowing them to build their own nuclear power plant at Bradwell. The Chinese have responded that they would no longer be interested in funding their (approx one third)...
Posted by Sohail Azad
On 06:31
With Labour trying to face several ways at once it looks more like chaos as the front bench tries to please everybody and fails to satisfy anybody at the same time.Jeremy Corbyn is quoted (quite rightly in my view) as saying that 'Tories have just put up the cost of your electricity by giving a blank cheque to EDF for a power station that doesn�t work' See: https://dwpexamination.wordpress.com/2016/07/31/jeremy-corbyn-facing-backlash-from-unions-momentum-activist-and-shadow-business-minister-over-hinkley-c-nuclear-opposition-huffington-post/On...
Posted by Sohail Azad
On 08:20
The just published 'Stern Review' on how research outputs of UK academics are going to be valued is likely to seriously blight the careers of British academics and lead to a 'brain drain' as they seek to advance their careers abroad. A change in the arcane rules of the 'Research Excellence Framework' (REF) will mean that the work of British academics is now likely to be of much higher value to foreign universities than British ones.Under the practices of academia every 6 years British university...
Posted by Sohail Azad
On 03:27
Theresa May may have gained short term kudos for 'stamping' her authority on the Hinkley decision by delaying it until the Autumn. But in reality all she may have done in the long term is emphasised the fact that she sanctioned a decision that resulted in the biggest industrial disaster to have affected the country in modern times. Once the Government signs the project it will be committed to footing the bill for a long running engineering construction foul-up, whatever the terms of the Government's...
Posted by Sohail Azad
On 14:03
(function(d, s, id) { var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "//connect.facebook.net/en_US/all.js#xfbml=1"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs); }(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk')); Breaking Story (3/13/18): The Financial Times has a story which mirrors the major points of our following blog article -- Go Here."We will become and stay totally...
Posted by Sohail Azad
On 07:37
The media is full of stories that EDF is about to announce a 'final investment decision' on Hinkley C nuclear power station, whereas the logic of its own press statements suggest that the project is in fact in deep freeze. Once again, EDF's superb public relations is convincing people that its disastrous Hinkley C power plant project is moving ahead, whilst the reality is that it is announcing that the project will not be started until at least 2019. And even this date seems to be associated with...
Posted by Sohail Azad
On 04:49
Early pronouncements from Philip Hammond and David Davis indicate that the Government is set to abandon hopes of remaining within the Single Market as the price the UK will have to pay for imposing immigration controls on EU citizens. This strategy is clearly aimed at pacifying those who prioritise reduction of immigration within the Tories and also reducing the attacks from the xenophobic right, whose 'respectable' wing resides in UKIP.Politically this might take the shine off the electoral threat...
Posted by Sohail Azad
On 03:44
�Always look on the bright side of life�. That was a theme associated with the �Life of Brian� (as is strife within the popular fronts of the Labour Party these days of course, but I won�t go into that now). So what�s good about Brexit? Well, it might be a crushing blow to our British economy and environmental laws, but in other ways it might actually help..... One way Brexit will definitely help is that the green interest groups will find it easier to get their way on various environmental...
Posted by Sohail Azad
On 03:26
The Dutch Government has awarded a contract to build two 350 MW Borssele offshore windfarms for 87 euros per MWh (�74 per MWh), some 25 per cent cheaper than the current value of the contract for Hinkley C. The contract has been awarded to DONG, in which the Danish Government has a majority share.This price for Borssele 1 and Borssele 2 includes transmission costs but, unlike the case of the proposed Hinkley C nuclear power station, the price does not include any offer of loan guarantees from the...
Posted by Sohail Azad
On 04:52
One largely unintended consequence of 'Brexit' is that the economic uncertainty and reduced economic growth are likely to produce a further fall in electricity demand which may mean we do not need any more big power stations other than those already being built.Lost behind the usual blizzard of insistence that blackouts will result if we don't build more gas and nuclear power plant is the fact that electricity demand has fallen over the last decade. According to Government figures (see DECC energy...
Posted by Sohail Azad
On 02:22
As predicted in earlier posts on this blog the UK is heading for the worst of all worlds compared to retaining full membership of the EU. Boris Johnson, in a staggering u-turn, has effectively accepted a 'Norweigian' solution whereby we are bound by the EU's rules (including free movement of labour) except that the UK will have no say in making the rules to which we will be subject! See http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-36637037But at least the British experience will dissuade others from...
Posted by Sohail Azad
On 06:00
We can see in the headlines that Nicola Sturgeon is threatening to 'veto' Brexit on the grounds that consent from the Scottish Parliament is required to stop Scotland being subject to EU laws. See http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-36633244 Are we heading for a full blown constitutional crisis with Scotland simply refusing to withdraw from the EU?Well, probably not in that sense, but the upshot is likely to be in a sort of quid-pro-quo that the Scottish Government's desire...
