One of the first things that got me to think seriously about climate tech was learning the Pentagon was one of the biggest funders of "alternative" energy, and seriously concerned with security of supply. The shale fracking thing (unfortunately in my view) blunted progress and in 2nd Bush W term a lot of that planning was shelved for the worst possible reasons.
The only thing worse than hearing that sort of ignorant sophistry from Helm was its uncritical, indeed exuberant, amplification across almost all UK media. If there's a crowd out there with funding for an anti-Tufton Street think tank that has a big chunk of its activity being in rapid response to that sort of wrongheaded nonsense, man we could use one and I'm pretty sure I know a couple fellas who'd do it well.
didn't realise Dieter Helm made that silly comment about tanks recharging. As if conventional tanks don't have to be constantly refilled by diesel and petrol!
He did and I, a political commentator with no energy or defence expertise- not even a driving licence to speak of- found it very much convincing and scary. So will sleep well after this ^
++ for picking up Helm up on the necessity of primary steel. Minor point being that if the UK does move to 100% EAFs, we will still likely need some processed iron to 'sweeten' the scrap, given downcycling of scrap over time. This could be imported in relatively small quantities from Sweden, Finland, Canada, Brazil, etc. or we could have a small H2 DRI facility somewhere in the UK - which might be a a more cost-effective use and store of excess electricity.
Indeed, I didn't get into the complexities of this in the article, but you are absolutely correct. There's some analysis that would need to be done on the volumes of pig iron you might need to reduce impurities in EAF output.
War runs on fossil fuels… logistics needs diesel to move anything. That said we are left with humongous amounts of legacy fossil fuel equipment , vulnerable to cheapo drone strikes, or unstoppable hyper sonic ballistics. Nice aircraft carrier you have here, my cheap missile can stop it being a drain on your resources, really really quickly. Main battle tanks don’t stand a chance . Nagorno-Karabakh proved that , followed by the s legacy Ukraine counter offensive last year…which was europe dumping it legacy equipment, to drain the RF..
Electric tanks….seriously? Let’s just look up primary versus secondary energy and leave it at that. Maybe
Ease off all that Chobham plate armour…saves on weight right?. Unless you’re suggesting long power cables.
War still needs 6” shells..to soften the beaten ground. RF makes 7 times the amount nato makes. Reason…..cheap coking coal. NATO has no raw material except for US and maybe Norway. No cheap coal (we do have expensive coal not much of that though), we’re cooked.
By he way….baddies have little submarine drones .. they can launch from any ship anywhere…silently. They can topple or otherwise wreck your sea windmills, for cheap. Just like the U.K. has been using in the Black Sea to take out shipping. So thanks for the map of the sea,lanes., did you get that from the BBC? Lol.
With ‘top level’ analysis like this we really are cooked. Electric tanks ..rotflmfao!
You think the Ukraine failed state, it’s French Riviera mafia government, and it’s agricultural resources have anything to do with the complex and technical proxy war to nail Eurasian resources and Western dominance of that area, then I can’t really add much
UK oil is exported and is sought after but gas stays in the UK or very occasionally gets exported across to Holland. We only have LNG gasification plants so are unable to export it as LNG either.
Its false information that gas sets the price of all UK electricity. For starters the renewable companies largely use PPAs to fix the price of their power for years ahead. In the day ahead market where most energy is bought gas does influence the price the majority of the time but renewables can drive it down when there is an excess. The stark reality though is that renewables need to generate to attract their subsidies so they can afford to drive the price down even negative to ensure they receive their ROC or CfD payment. The MSM and the eco warriors latch onto these negative prices to claim how renewables are cheap but overlook the subsidies and the other system costs associated with the inevitable uncertainty around renewables output thus a true cost is never presented. The harsh facts are renewables will never be cheap but thats the price to reduce CO2 and politicians should be more honest about that.
The goal is fine but the speed at which we can realise it economically is being disregarded by Miliband. We are going to need oil & gas for many decades albeit in reducing quantity but we are still going to need it so it makes absolute sense for us to exploit what we have.
He wants NZ leccy by 2030 albeit with small amount of gas - the only benefit is the windmill, high voltage electrical manufacturers and steelworks in other countries not UK jobs ease it out 5-10 yrs and require 50% local content should be the strategy.
Hes stopped anymore oil & gas exploration licences but we are going to need it for decades. So we will still be importing it from countries we don't necessarily like whose environmental standards are worse.
The oil and gas extracted from the north sea is mostly sent abroad, so that's a moot point and irrelevant. Politicians have to be ambitious by nature, a target of 2030 is good even if we don't achieve it as we do need to move rapidly away from gas generated electricity for our bills to come down, that's the aim there. There'll still be hella gas used for cooking and industrial purposes, not seen anything that fails to recognise that. Still time to see pushes for 50% components manufactured here, agree that would be great. Difficult to achieve that in 4 years though building out factories takes time and stability to draw in investment. Suspect something along those lines will be in the next manifesto but I am reaching a fair bit there though. I've interviewed for a few strategic roles in EMCCA and WYCA though and can say those kinda things are being considered.
Really, really, really great piece.
One of the first things that got me to think seriously about climate tech was learning the Pentagon was one of the biggest funders of "alternative" energy, and seriously concerned with security of supply. The shale fracking thing (unfortunately in my view) blunted progress and in 2nd Bush W term a lot of that planning was shelved for the worst possible reasons.
The only thing worse than hearing that sort of ignorant sophistry from Helm was its uncritical, indeed exuberant, amplification across almost all UK media. If there's a crowd out there with funding for an anti-Tufton Street think tank that has a big chunk of its activity being in rapid response to that sort of wrongheaded nonsense, man we could use one and I'm pretty sure I know a couple fellas who'd do it well.
didn't realise Dieter Helm made that silly comment about tanks recharging. As if conventional tanks don't have to be constantly refilled by diesel and petrol!
He did and I, a political commentator with no energy or defence expertise- not even a driving licence to speak of- found it very much convincing and scary. So will sleep well after this ^
++ for picking up Helm up on the necessity of primary steel. Minor point being that if the UK does move to 100% EAFs, we will still likely need some processed iron to 'sweeten' the scrap, given downcycling of scrap over time. This could be imported in relatively small quantities from Sweden, Finland, Canada, Brazil, etc. or we could have a small H2 DRI facility somewhere in the UK - which might be a a more cost-effective use and store of excess electricity.
Indeed, I didn't get into the complexities of this in the article, but you are absolutely correct. There's some analysis that would need to be done on the volumes of pig iron you might need to reduce impurities in EAF output.
War runs on fossil fuels… logistics needs diesel to move anything. That said we are left with humongous amounts of legacy fossil fuel equipment , vulnerable to cheapo drone strikes, or unstoppable hyper sonic ballistics. Nice aircraft carrier you have here, my cheap missile can stop it being a drain on your resources, really really quickly. Main battle tanks don’t stand a chance . Nagorno-Karabakh proved that , followed by the s legacy Ukraine counter offensive last year…which was europe dumping it legacy equipment, to drain the RF..
Electric tanks….seriously? Let’s just look up primary versus secondary energy and leave it at that. Maybe
Ease off all that Chobham plate armour…saves on weight right?. Unless you’re suggesting long power cables.
War still needs 6” shells..to soften the beaten ground. RF makes 7 times the amount nato makes. Reason…..cheap coking coal. NATO has no raw material except for US and maybe Norway. No cheap coal (we do have expensive coal not much of that though), we’re cooked.
By he way….baddies have little submarine drones .. they can launch from any ship anywhere…silently. They can topple or otherwise wreck your sea windmills, for cheap. Just like the U.K. has been using in the Black Sea to take out shipping. So thanks for the map of the sea,lanes., did you get that from the BBC? Lol.
With ‘top level’ analysis like this we really are cooked. Electric tanks ..rotflmfao!
Don’t sound so surprised.
You think the Ukraine failed state, it’s French Riviera mafia government, and it’s agricultural resources have anything to do with the complex and technical proxy war to nail Eurasian resources and Western dominance of that area, then I can’t really add much
The UK has been using USVs to attack shipping in the black sea?
UK oil is exported and is sought after but gas stays in the UK or very occasionally gets exported across to Holland. We only have LNG gasification plants so are unable to export it as LNG either.
Its false information that gas sets the price of all UK electricity. For starters the renewable companies largely use PPAs to fix the price of their power for years ahead. In the day ahead market where most energy is bought gas does influence the price the majority of the time but renewables can drive it down when there is an excess. The stark reality though is that renewables need to generate to attract their subsidies so they can afford to drive the price down even negative to ensure they receive their ROC or CfD payment. The MSM and the eco warriors latch onto these negative prices to claim how renewables are cheap but overlook the subsidies and the other system costs associated with the inevitable uncertainty around renewables output thus a true cost is never presented. The harsh facts are renewables will never be cheap but thats the price to reduce CO2 and politicians should be more honest about that.
The goal is fine but the speed at which we can realise it economically is being disregarded by Miliband. We are going to need oil & gas for many decades albeit in reducing quantity but we are still going to need it so it makes absolute sense for us to exploit what we have.
Has Milliband said anything to the contrary?
He wants NZ leccy by 2030 albeit with small amount of gas - the only benefit is the windmill, high voltage electrical manufacturers and steelworks in other countries not UK jobs ease it out 5-10 yrs and require 50% local content should be the strategy.
Hes stopped anymore oil & gas exploration licences but we are going to need it for decades. So we will still be importing it from countries we don't necessarily like whose environmental standards are worse.
The oil and gas extracted from the north sea is mostly sent abroad, so that's a moot point and irrelevant. Politicians have to be ambitious by nature, a target of 2030 is good even if we don't achieve it as we do need to move rapidly away from gas generated electricity for our bills to come down, that's the aim there. There'll still be hella gas used for cooking and industrial purposes, not seen anything that fails to recognise that. Still time to see pushes for 50% components manufactured here, agree that would be great. Difficult to achieve that in 4 years though building out factories takes time and stability to draw in investment. Suspect something along those lines will be in the next manifesto but I am reaching a fair bit there though. I've interviewed for a few strategic roles in EMCCA and WYCA though and can say those kinda things are being considered.