Sellafield
From yesterday’s Observer:
In fact, Sellafield is a classic illustration of the failure of British industry. We were pioneers of nuclear power but in our desire to build our own atomic weapons, failed abysmally when it came to developing and managing our own civil reactors and reprocessing plants.
As a result, we have been left with a multibillion-pound clean-up bill and the prospect of buying either American or French reactors for our next generation nuclear plants. The lesson of Sellafield is not so much that nuclear power is dangerous but that Britain seems incapable of implementing any long-term engineering plan that comes its way, from high-speed trains to wind turbines or rocket launchers.
Crazy idea of the week
Three words: backyard nuclear power.
To be honest, I can’t tell if this is crazy good or crazy bad. On the one hand, compact self-contained nukes would give better output – more of it and more predictable – than similarly distributed renewables. But still, the units are buried underground and every 7 to 10 years, a lorry full of fresh uranium comes round to your house (well more realistically your local factory, industrial estate etc.), digs up the reactor to refuel it, and takes away the old waste. Although the transportation of nuclear materials has been relatively safe to date, I wonder how things change when you start shipping around lots of little containers rather than a few big loads (ignoring medical isotopes).
The first units are scheduled for delivery in five to ten years to a Czech utility company.
A promising start
It looks as though the new Energy and Climate department is getting off on the right foot. Buried part way down this article is a quote from the minister saying that the Energy Bill will be amended to incorporate a feed-in tariff for microgeneration. Finally.
For years, microgeneration advocates have looked at the rapid deployment of solar and wind in Germany and called for similar incentives, which pay microgen owners for exporting their electricity to the grid, here in the UK. But in 2005, my research found that the UK government was fundamentally opposed to this option as an unnecessary intervention in the market. Obviously, market intervention has become a little more fashionable of late but there have also been serious economic analyses published to say it is in fact more economically-efficient to promote renewables and microgeneration using a feed-in tariff, rather than the current renewables obligation mechanism.
Of course the details haven’t been announced yet. But that the fact that a feed-in tariff is now being considered, alongside the government’s new commitment to a 80% – not 60% – reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, suggests that things may be changing in Whitehall. Let’s wait and see.
No longer the bridesmaid
After years of being shoehorned into BERR and Defra, the BBC is reporting that energy and climate issues are to be tackled by a new ministry led by Ed Miliband. Very sensible move and I’ll be keen to see how effective it will be in tying together the different policy threads.
Talk, talk, talk
The government has launched yet another energy policy consultation and Ashley Seager hit the nail on the head: why more talk? I’ve lost track of the number of energy consultations and white papers since Labour came to power but I’m pretty sure I’d need both hands and feet to count them.
How to be polite on national TV
There’s a great video on the Sustainable Development Commission website where Jonathan Porritt takes the government to task over its flip-flop on home energy monitors. But the best bit is when he’s asked if anyone in government (especially BERR) really gets climate change. Watch from about 6:45 on – it’s a masterclass in media diplomacy.