Britain is to be left without backup coal power plants this winter after the energy companies Drax and EDF confirmed plans to close their remaining stations, despite the backup being needed last winter. The Telegraph has the story.
The National Grid on Wednesday said it had ended talks with the two companies about keeping open West Burton A, in Nottinghamshire, and two coal-fired units at Drax’s plant in Selby, Yorkshire, after they made clear that the sites would not be available.
Last winter, the companies were paid to keep these coal units on standby as a final resort to keep the lights on if gas and renewable energy generation ran low.
But the refusal of EDF and Drax to keep the facilities open means the Grid will be unable to keep this so-called winter contingency in reserve again.
A third coal power station that participated last year, Uniper’s Ratcliffe-on-Soar, also in Nottinghamshire, will continue to operate but only on a commercial basis, meaning it is not available as a contingency.
The National Grid, which owns and operates Britain’s main electricity system, had been asked by ministers to find out whether the coal plants would be available again and revealed earlier this month that it was in talks about doing so.
But on Wednesday the company said: “These discussions have now concluded. Both operators have confirmed that they will not be able to make their coal units available for a further winter and have begun the decommissioning process.”
Drax said that the decision not to keep the Yorkshire coal units going was “due to a combination of technical, maintenance and staffing reasons”.
It means the National Grid will not be able to call upon a separate reserve of coal-generated power during times of system stress.
Worth reading in full.
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Power cuts must be odds on this winter then.
Though, perhaps, the reality jolt that they will bring is exactly what we need, for the majority of people to understand the insanity of our current energy policy/fantasy.
I remember the early 70s, rolling power cuts, three day week. Fortunately this situation did not last long as it was due to miners’ strikes and OPEC shenanigans, but our current plight is going to be permanent.
Currently wind is supplying 12% of power, down from 16% yesterday.
The majority of people are so imbecilic that they’ve been jabbed.
It will indeed be a reality jolt, the future seems to be based on Electric Cars and Electric Heat Pumps, indeed this whole net-zero hoo-haa is based on the call to ‘electrify – electrify’ and so if the electric goes off? people will be alarmed as to how the future is going to work. Cue Keir Starmer who will say that if only everyone had followed Labour’s green energy revolution plan all would have been OK. A complete load of tosh but I am afraid it will be enough to get; Blair mk2, Starmer, the arch globalist, elected into power.
The jabbed masses will say the power cuts are because the nasty Tories did not spend enormous sums of other people’s money on Save-the-Planet boondoggles (PV panels and windmills).
Agreed.
Despite the reality that the Tories did absolutely “spend enormous sums of other people’s money on Save-the Planet boondoggles.”
Just as there seem to be no problems with Indian and Chinese CO2, only ours; Tories wasting resources on an epic scale, isn’t enough to win even a primary school ‘star of the week’, let alone a vote.
After all, just as with HS2, Zero Covid, spending actual Billions on Ruinable Energy, everything should have been done “Sooner, Harder, More Viciously, Longer (or preferably for EVER.)
That will be the ticket! And the allegedly “Conservative” Party thinks everything’s fine!
Unfortunately I think you are right but by then there will be no turning back.
Best get my log stores filled up then….
I suspect the banning of coal and wood burning is now 60 – 40 in favour of a ban.
Got to save the planet.
It will be until their gadgets suddenly can’t work… By then it will be too late.
This collapse of the system is all planned & the politicians will do sweet Fanny Adams about it.
Taking personal responsibility within our own abilities, building communities is what we can do & resisting their idiocy with all our will.
It’s really heading into early Soviet territory, akin to starving the farmers: make central heating unaffordable and when people start burning wood, the state arrest people for burning wood to keep warm. It’s a pincer movement. And they’ll shut town halls to stop winter viruses spreading, so people will freeze to death at home. Maybe Just Stop Oil activists will agree to stop using heating, stop using ovens and give away all their clothes to the needy. If they freeze to death, we can all burn coal the next winter and not have to put up with their whinging!!
EDF is on the WEF hydrogen council and is fully immersed in the climate hysteria Carbon Zero agenda. Running coal plants is bad for their ESG score.
Same goes for Drax “Drax Group CEO Will Gardiner joins WEF’s Alliance of CEO Climate Leaders”
They will happily let the country go into rolling blackouts. It won’t affect their financing, profit margin or their cosy jet fuelled visits to Davos.
“We are going to have to get used to using electricity as and when it is available”——–The head of the National Grid (Steve Holliday) about 10 years ago. ——–Welcome to the Eco Socialist world of pretending to save the planet where we can all have some electricity “as and when it is available”, which means if the wind happens to be blowing at the right speed. If not then the Smart Meter will take charge of the situation and price you out of using it or even cut you off altogether.
That is always worth repeating. I worked for the CEGB and then NGC and I hope the staff I worked with would have never accepted this nonsense.
Its pretty sure this a stitch up..
If the power security of the nation is threatened they should be nationalised and no compensation paid.. and no I’m not a rabid socialist..
I was really hoping for a dreadful winter last time round. It will come and I hope it is this year. Off go the lights, the heat and maybe, just maybe, people will stop being Sheep. I do not hold my breath on this though. I genuinely think they like being Sheep and incapable of rational thought.
You have to rememember they’ve got all that wool keeping them warm.. 😉
Is this not the way we ended up with lockdowns last time?
Cut NHS capacity, then lockdown because the NHS can’t cope.
Cut back on energy production, then when the system can’t cope impose sone draconian measures.
It might not be actual lockdowns, but it will be some form of mandated and enforced deprivation (for the plebs).
Putin’s fault innit.
WHAT A FU-KING JOKE !!
Glad we’re off to warmer climes…
Emigrating?
Escaping this country is looking like a definite option.
Im trying to not lose hope that the resistance is coming..
As Vigano recently states
https://youtu.be/Q3lb1MFDh7Y
Britain’s crazy energy policy.
You couldn’t make it up.
And all when we’re sitting on an absolute fortune in gas, coal and oil.
As with water, viruses, (and any other issue) manufacture a crisis, call an emergency, lock down and imprison the masses whilst the elite float on.
We have the fuel, but the elitists are forcing a fuel crisis on us. This is the equivalent of starving to death in a fully-stocked kitchen, because the cupboards are locked!
If we have to save power, an obvious, painless saving would be would be to turn off all street lights nationwide between 2am and 5am. In my neighbourhood, I doubt anyone is out and about walking at that time!
I think that’s a potential proposal by our corrupt leader class, but it misses the point.
This isn’t an accident this is a policy choice. We don’t have to have the most expensive electricity in Europe, possibly the world, we don’t have to let coal plants close, stop gas extraction. Our corrupt parasite class is doing this on purpose.
This country is the test case for energy crisis management.
This winter will be dark indeed.
I don’t have streetlights, I have a nifty device called a torch.
I absolutely agree about the utter wastefulness of much streetlighting. Some will say it’s for safety. I say don’t go out at 2am unless for work.
Don’t encourage the barstewards.
Why should people driving at night forego the obvious benefits of streetlighting that they have helped pay for?
In a properly run energy system (having allowed for the 10%+ extra population our Beloved Leaders allowed in), electricity for streetlighting is a rounding error, which we could pay for easily by flogging our energy from fracking to the Germans, Danes, Dutch etc etc rather than paying them up to £10,000 per MWhr to stop our lights going out???
For the record, Drax burning Selby Coal used to be £30 – £35 per MWhr.
Coming from the outskirts of a city and the edge of moorland, car headlights and cat’s eyes are more than sufficient for driving in the dark. Arriving in the city limits late at night is surreal: brightly lit roads and pavements and not a soul in sight. The lights can be justified in the evening and potentially even until as late as 2am at weekends. But even getting home on the bus at 7pm in my well-populated area, pre-lockdown, I was struck by how deserted the streets were. I never once saw another person on the half mile walk home. There might be arguments for some variation in parts of city centres, but most of the country could sleep soundly without them for three hours or so a night.
I used to hitchike from Hull back home to Cornwall when I was at university. One day I hitched with a driver of a 20 tonne tipper truck. (1981). He said he was taking coal to Drax power staion – but “God knows why – there must be 2 to 3 years stock there and I’m doing half a dozen trips a day”.
A year or 2 later, Scargill took the miners out on strike again – like they did under Ted Heath’s government a couple of times in the 1970’s. Ian McGregor headed the government resistance and had prepared well.
Those were the days when the conservatives goverened properly, had people of stature and intelligence and resisted the shit thrown at them by the socialists and communists. Margaret Thatcher and her ministers understood the importance of energy supplies and did not want a repeat of the country being held to hostage by the mining union.
Sadly, the party has declined very rapidly since then.
It makes me weep.
Scargill was a fool because he could not see the stocks of coal building up in his backyard. He also started the strike in summer when electricity demand was low. Who would have thought that it is now the polticians who are the fools doing what Scargill failed to do.
I don’t see what the problem is. Put on two pullovers and do some starjumps to keep warm.
Tell that to an old lady who is half blind and uses crutches or a wheelchair! Just let her die of hypothermia eh?
Three pullovers, some new glasses and a sturdy walking stick then.
Infantile
Not the sharpest of utensils are you?
Better than being an asshole troll.
I thought this was a a forum for intelligent people. Clearly I need to explain to you pair what is bleeding obvious to most. My comment was a dig (with a ‘hint’ of sarcasm) at OVO Energy and all the other idiotic commentators over the energy crisis. OVO Energy thought it was great idea for people struggling with energy bills to do star jumps and cuddle pets to keep warm in winter. Others thought putting on two jumpers would solve the crisis for those on low incomes. You insult me because my cynical sarcasm towards the Energy industry eludes you.
EDF is more or less owned by the French state.
Drax’s biggest shareholders are:
Invesco Limited 9%
Schroders plc 9%
Bank of America Corporation 8%
Blackrock 7%
Orbis Holdings Limited 4%
Doubtless Vanguard and State Street are lurking somewhere under the disclosure threshold!
So what’s their agenda? Could France make money flogging us excess power from their country? We already know Blackrock and co are forcing eco-lunacy on businesses globally.
The British Government, if it has the balls to do so, should seize control of the power stations and keep them open. The Government was happy enough to trash all our liberties, so lets see these ‘tough guys’ go up against the villains who want to help freeze old people to death this winter and take over the stations. The silence will be deafening…
I wonder who HMG will blame for the power cuts?
Oh, they’ll blame us. They’ll stigmatise people putting their Christmas tree lights on all day, even if they’re negligible-energy LED lights. They’ll tell people to cut the lighting in their homes and operate off low power lamps. Expect peak time charges: with the internet of things, they can detect what electrical devices you’re using and when, so it’ll be a £20 an hour surcharge to cook your Christmas lunch!
They won’t turn off street lights in the middle of the night, which is the obvious thing to do. When you think how much power is used to keep streets lit all night long, when basically no one is walking them in most neighbourhoods or even in city centres, that should be the first step. I’d be perfectly delighted if the blue-white light outside my bedroom – that even blackout curtains can’t entirely block – was turned off. So would the birds who are disorientated by daylight-tint street lights and thus are still singing at two in the morning!
But the state will want to suck the joy out of our lives, so primetime television hours will be hit for sure. And dinner time. It’s sick.
This is nonsense.
If streetlightling helps prevent one accident, one rape, it is silly cheap.
And they have invested Billions ensuring that “primetime television” is kept on in big cities, an essential part of their very successful “Bread and Circuses” population control.
Bellenders, Strictly come Prancing, the Footy, all help to keep peoples’ minds relaxed whilst they enslave us all.
If streetlightling helps prevent one accident, one rape, it is silly cheap.
Gerbage!!!!! Just utter, utter garbage on toast spread on top of large helpings of butter and jam!!!! Most streets are deserted between two and five in the morning in most of the country! Few people walk them if they have any good sense or legitimate purpose. Your mindset is exactly the same as the one that led to lockdowns!!
If someone is going to assault another person, that person can do it just as easily with streetlights on at 3am, because the streets are basically empty. Most roads have cat’s eyes. It’s anything but ‘silly cheap’: it’s insanely expensive and unnecessary. People can buy Maglites and IR goggles if they need them and most lifestyles can be adapted with minute adjustments. In a simple cost benefit analysis, it’s clear that the lights are a huge waste of money.
As for television, they banned sport in a heartbeat in 2020, so don’t assume the modern technocrats understand bread and circuses. They know people will still watch primetime TV and thus can peak-time charge for it, knowing people will swallow the cost.
This is a dereliction of duty on the part of the Not-a-Conservative-Party.
Farage (as usual) hit the nail on the head. The intelligence of a standard MP has never been so low. We are being directed by numbskulls and the citizens will pay a heavy price for their ineptitude. Matt Hancock anyone????
That reminds me of a comment made by Dr Thomas Sowell: “It is hard to imagine a more stupid or dangerous way of making decisions than by putting them in the hands of people who pay no price for being wrong.” Let’s celebrate this great man who is 93 tomorrow.