Friday
Feb262016
by 
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill The energy case for Brexit
Feb 26, 2016 EU Energy: grid UKIP UKIP makes the case that the EU is wrecking the UK energy supply, making it expensive and unreliable. This a party political piece rather than something designed for the Brexit campaign per se.
There were certainly some commenters on my earlier EU thread who thought that British pols were green-minded enough to trash the energy system in this country without any help from Brussels, which in some ways is the case that UKIP are making here.
Reader Comments (29)
There is a huge element of 'I will if you will' when it comes to Green Blob. UK warmists egg other countries on and then go further to prove that we're even more committed. In a post Brexit World, come of the interaction will cease because we won't be at the all same meetings. Ministers will be watching the pennies (billions) closer. Ministers will have less free time to think up ways of wasting our money.
However I'm not getting my hopes up because we're a country of Safe Spacers and Brexit is very ulikely.
Sadly I think she is about spot on, except I fear a future where we are bound to gas and have scrapped all nuclear and coal.
IF the world suddenly went 'gas' I do not think gas prices would remain where they are now, and the cost of gas generation would soar above current nuclear prices.
I spoke to a man who had been involved with the CEGB at the time of the last nuclear power build out - Sizewell B - "One day we were building nukes, the next day there was North Sea Gas, and crippling interest rates, and we were told to build gas".
What the government perhaps COULD do, especially a libertarian UKIP style one outside of the EU, is to reduce the regulatory burden and the planning burden on nuclear, which would slash its costs in half - or more.
But I fear today's youth are so indoctrinated that they will continue voting Red, Green and Blue*, until the lights do go out and their fondle slabs and Jesus phones stop working, before they will contemplate actually voting for a power generation technology that both actually works, and is somewhat insulated from the world fossil markets.
* It occurs to me that red green and blue together make for a single colorless entity...hmm.
Why oh why did we allow ourselves to be subsumed into an un-elected, un-democratic, un-accountable, & un-sackable, totalitarian guvment! The EU parliament has little or no power, EU Commissioners decide our laws, & rule us imposing ever more repressive legislation, not the peoples of Europe.
As I am sure we all remember, those televised debates on national television, when the EU Parliament summoned the respective Commissioners to Parliament, & demanded to know how the PIP scandal involving millions of stressed out women around the world should their faulty breast implants burst spilling industrial grade silicone into their bodies, could happen, & the horsemeat scandal in pre-packaged food, as a result of mass fraud. Oh wait a minute, it was all in a dream I once had, it never really happened & nobody was actually held to account for a rubber-stamping exercise! Medical Equipment is an EU Competence & breast implants are defined as medical equipment, food safety & standards are an EU Competence, & horsemeat entering the food-chain was illegal & fraudulent! Oh well never mind, hey, it's only people's lives we're talking about after all?
Common Purpose politicians in charge of he UK follow EU diktat, in particular energy. This is because Common Purpose has for 27 years used the fake IPCC science to indoctrinate recruits, in particular the late 1980s PPE cohort.
This is Scientology Lite so it is no wonder that the present 'Tory' Government is still pushing renewables despite the onset of major power cuts this winter, also the harm to the economy. The traditional Tories like Howard who have at last cottoned onto the takeover of their Party by totalitarian socialists in Tory clothing, are now reacting. It may be too late but I suspect this reaction has been planned very thoroughly.
I cycled to work this morning watching the wind turbines not turning. Does it never occur to our mindless leaders that, once the proper power stations have all been shut down, wind turbines not turning is going to become something of a problem?
I agree with everything in the video but why was it so poorly put together? My ten year old daughter makes better quality videos than that on an iPod Touch and iMovies.
The European LCPD wiped out 11.5 GW of UK plant in one swipe.
The Green Blob want the electorate to be powerless.
I am a card carrying UKIP party member but they have got this one wrong. Right now the problem is caused by successive governments including Conservatives, Lib Dems and Labour backing the Climate Change Act. The proposals in the (very poor as has been said) video would change nothing without repealing the CCA.
Surely that can't be their best argument.
Stonyground
I went for a leisure cycle this morning, at one point in the distance I could see the "cloud" from Civaux Nuclear Power Plant generating 1495MW and keeping nearly 700 people gainfully employed in one of France's poorest regions. I could also see the Adriers windturbines, 5 Vestas V100s it was a breezy morning for these parts 8-12kph according to the weather app on my phone, so although they were turning they weren't at anything like optimum output, nor were they employing any of the locals. Yet Hollande is keen on switching from reliable nuclear to useless wind.
The madness isn't limited to the UK, nor the EU for that matter so I see no reason to think Brexit will halt the mad headlong dash to self=Immolation by the UK.
UKIP is the only party with a sensible energy policy.
According to 'Commission Communication: A Framework Strategy for a Resilient Energy Union with a Forward-Looking Climate Change Policy (COM/2015/080 final) of 25 February 2015':
Two mutually exclusive objectives; that sums up the EU.
The only problem with the UKIP policy is that they accept that CO2 really does cause warming and therefore they accept the need to decarbonise even if it is in a less dramatic way ^.^
Dung on Feb 26, 2016 at 1:33 PM
I agree. The 2008 CCA is Law, so it ill behoves a government to step out of line while it is still on the statute books. However, they could repeal it, except that it would mean getting a majority in both Houses of Parliament, which is unlikely, especially as we have the referendum coming up so soon, which will be taking up a lot of attention. Also, many within the public sector, charities, QUANGOs, single issue pressure groups and 'government scientists' would rise up, financed by other people's money, to prevent it being repealed. Even though the act might go further than EU policy, removing it would certainly take us below EU policy, and there would be all those subsidy and grant fed 'industrialists' to contend with as well as the EU monolith.
So, if you cannot repeal it, it has to be supported! Crazy, but true.
The referendum date has been set and, in the meantime, the public will become aware of our catastrophic energy policy through news items. The people I meet who think windmills are saving the planet will not be persuaded by facts, rational thought or even warnings: it will take blackouts, somewhere in this country, and even then, I am not sure of that! :)
Dung on Feb 26, 2016 at 2:02 PM
Do you have a reference to that?
The CCA 2008 does not have to be repealed. The Secretary of State can amend the targets and make it meaningless:
There certainly have been changes in scientific knowledge (it was settled in 2008), but it seems to be no longer settled.
@Phillip Bratby: It is interesting I think that such a provision was put into place. Was this as a result of amendments to the original Bill passing through the HoC & the HoL?
Feb 26, 2016 at 2:15 PM | Registered CommenterRobert Christopher
I can not give an instant reference but I have watched Roger Helmer speak on energy and climate change plus I read everything in the manifesto, UKIP seems to be a Luke Warming organisation ^.^
Phillip Bratby
All other issues aside; Cameron will not allow the CCA to be repealed (I would be willing to wager a small sum and hope that I would lose it).
Feb 26, 2016 at 2:15 PM | Registered CommenterRobert Christopher
I just checked the 2015 manifesto; it supports coal but also Carbon Capture and Storage, in addition it states that current policies will do nothing to reduce emissions.
Dung
It does mention it, but I don't think it supports it. It is also somewhat at odds with "The Climate Change Act is doing untold damage. UKIP will repeal it."
It only mentions 'carbon capture' once, here:
"Bearing this in mind, UKIP will:
• Set up a commission to investigate ways to assist and rejuvenate the coal industry
• Seek to secure the survival and expansion of our indigenous coal industry in the form of deep, opencast and drift mining
• Drop all subsidies for wind and solar power, to ensure a level playing field for coal
• Discontinue the carbon floor tax on the basis that production for coal fired power stations is combined with carbon capture and storage
• Halt the decline of coal power stations and seek private funding to develop new, efficient plants."
I don't think that makes it much of a supporter of CC&S, if at all. The goal is to discontinue the carbon floor tax, given some assumptions that have already been made (by others?). And we all know that any economic review would see 'issues' with CC&S. It could have been phrased better, but it has to start from where the country is, not where we want to.
"I have watched Roger Helmer speak on energy and climate change plus I read everything in the manifesto, UKIP seems to be a Luke Warming organisation "
Anything even lukewarm is a very welcome difference from the stance of the other parties, who would have us happily paying 2 to 3 times for our electricity and facing power blackouts, just to look good saving the planet. Roger Helmer, UKIP's energy spokesman has a degree in mathematics which stands him in good stead on understanding the technical issues. Unlike Amber Rudd at DECC, History, Ed Davey, PPE, Chris Huhne, PPE, Ed Miliband, PPE.
Of course, to paraphrase Sir Humphrey, "Why would they be the head of an energy department if they knew anything about electricity?".
Where logic would dictate stepping even a few short paces away from the political norm, it would still be considered too radical by the establishment politicians. You would be seen to disappoint the consensus and disturb the equilibrium. Leading the establishment a little at a time, is the art of politics in the absence of an enabling new epoch. The public now put concerns over global warming at a much lower priority, which helps. In order to retract quickly from the self inflicted and insecure position of UK electricity supplies, the fundamental change in the political landscape which will allow step changes on policy to be acceptable, could be a successful vote for Brexit.
Having seen that deep change in politics is possible through the ballot box, the public will have an appetite for further change. Not just on energy, but also cutting down and reforming the House of Lords, now 850 strong, proportional representation, and being able to impeach wayward MPs; you may add your own radical changes. In this new political dimension for the UK, where we have the extra £18bn a year otherwise gone to the EU to spend, the return of a huge tract of self-governmental powers, and our own influential seats back at the WTO and UN, the world's fifth largest economy can confidently and freely set its own goals, including energy, for the future.
Your chances of making a rational difference to UK politics, where Westminster can only be focused on the UK and is only responsible to the UK, are therefore massively increased. Brexit is a gift which will keep on giving.
Feb 26, 2016 at 2:13 PM | Robert Christopher
"Also, many within the public sector, charities, QUANGOs, single issue pressure groups and 'government scientists' would rise up...
Are you sure those five entities aren't just five ways of referring to the same one?
English hobbits are unable to accept that they live within the center of Mordor.
Mercantile Europe is not a empire - it is your hinterland.
All roads lead to Rome.
All internal Eu surplus trade flows to London.
@Dork, 6:48: "English hobbits are unable to ..etc"
The Brexit applies to the whole United Kingdom - Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland, as well England. You seem to have a better grip on the geography/politics of Middle Earth, than the British Isles.
Re UKIPs energy policy.
We need to acknowledge that energy policy is a moving feast, with the need to keep the noisy ones - if not on board - at least satisfied that UKIP are not to radical.
If Nigel were to say that CO2 does not contribute to effective warming or that temperatures have been flat for the last 18 years, we would immediately be involved in a firestorm of negative publicity.
Even though everything Nigel had said was true, the MSM would spin in such a negative way that UKIP would suffer slightly.
Things are definitely changing. The media is publishing more and more sensible reviews of papers that suggest the IPCC is just a little bit wrong. 5 years ago that would have been unheard of.
I thought the video was OK . apart from the drop in volume audio in the second part
Feb 26, 2016 at 5:06 PM | Registered CommenterRobert Christopher
As many on BH point out when I beg for the CCA to be repealed, it actually does not need to be repealed, it can be substantially amended by the DECC Secretary of State and the targets can be reduced. Cameron of course would never allow that even if the world froze over (which it likely will sometime in the next 1000/few hundred years due to the lack of solar activity).
I do not endear myself to my fellow BH colleagues by saying so but there is no need to appear radical just to state that CO2 does not cause warming :) Museums and other custodians of knowledge (such as the Smithsonian in Washington) contain geological records of past climate. If you look at this chart
http://www.biocab.org/Geological_Timescale.jpg
(and there are many like it) you see the relationship of atmospheric CO2 and global temperature over 4.5 billion years. The chart is based on the work of Dr C.R. Scotese from the University of Texas at Arlington. The chart shows that over long periods there is no relationship between CO2 and temperature at all.
I can well believe that EUphilic federasts are happy to hobble the British energy industry. In exactly the same way that Heath & Co trashed the British fishing industry in the 1970s.