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UK facing widespread power cuts, says government
1 Sep 2009The UK faces widespread power cuts for the first time since the 1970s, according to the Government's own predictions.
Demand for electricity from homes and businesses is set to exceed the available supply within eight years.
The Tories accused ministers of putting their "heads in the sand" and risking leaving millions of people without reliable energy.
Power rationing has not taken place in Britain since the 1970s, when a three-day week was brought in to preserve coal during a miners' strike.
The latest figures cast doubt over the Government's pledge that renewable sources can make up for lower output from nuclear and coal.
They were slipped out in an appendix to the Low Carbon Transition Plan, which was launched in July. The main document set out a target for "clean" technology - such as wind, wave and solar - to supply 40% of the country's power by 2020.
But the extra section suggests that there will be a shortfall by 2017, when the "energy unserved" level is predicted to reach 3,000 megawatt hours per year.
That would be equivalent to the whole of the Nottingham area being without electricity for a day.
By 2025 the situation is expected to worsen, with the shortfall hitting 7,000 megawatt hours per year.
That would be equivalent to an hour-long power cut for half of Britain over the course of a year.
Shadow energy secretary Greg Clark said: "Britain faces blackouts because the Government has put its head in the sand about Britain's energy policy for a decade.
"Over the next 10 years we need to replace one third of our generating capacity but Labour has left it perilously late, and has been forced to admit they expect power cuts for the first time since the 1970s.
"The next government has an urgent task to accelerate the deployment of a new generating capacity, and to take steps to ensure that, as a matter of national security, there is enough capacity to provide a robust margin of safety."
The looming power shortage is caused by the scheduled closure by 2015 of nine oil and coal-fired power plants, as part of ant-pollution measures.
Four existing nuclear power plants are also set to be shut, adding to the need for new sources of energy.
Mr Clark claimed that the scale of the blackouts could be three times worse than the government predictions.
He said some of the modelling used was "optimistic" because it assumed little or no change in electricity demand up until 2020.
It also assumes a rapid increase in wind farm capacity, and that existing nuclear power stations will be granted extensions to their "lifetimes", according to Mr Clark.
Reader views (11)
Another New Labour catastrophe. 12 year now they have ignored or vacilated on this issue knowing that are existing nuclear power stations were coming to the end of their useful lives. Not fit to be in government.
- David Stephens, London, 01/09/2009 15:42
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Governments get away with this because we allow them to. I'm sick of everyone blaming the morons in government for our problems. They are morons. Thats what morons do. We need a radical change of direction. Its time to wake up, get angry and start marching on all the major issues affecting our lives. The free market model is not working. We have all the technology we need to make safer renewable energy a workable alternative. The pursuit of profit before people is the only reason why this issue and all the others have not been tackled effectively.
- Colm Mcdermott, Galway, Ireland, 01/09/2009 13:47
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They should start on the Severn barrage, now! It could be built within eight years of starting construction.
It would provide 15% of the whole nation's electricity needs. It would be fully renewable tidal power, generating no CO2.
Yes, there is an environmental downside. It would reduce the tidal range in the upstream part of the Severn. It would become pretty much like the natural state of the Thames estuary today, which is hardly the environmental wasteland which barrage-opponents claim. In my book, that's a price well worth paying.
We'll also need nuclear power stations to replace our ageing ones, before they become totally unreliable (and possibly unsafe). The contracts should be signed and construction started a.s.a.p. The obvious locations are next to the ageing nuclear power stations that they are going to replace. No NIMBY argument, because there's already a nuclear plant in those backyards!
We elect politicians to run the country. They interfere with all the minutae of everyday life that they should stay out of, and yet when there's a really important issue that'll affect us all, they sit and yammer and do precisely nothing!
- Nigel, London, 01/09/2009 13:09
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Blame the Greens and their ridiculous no progess at any cost agenda. You'll find then camped out in Hampstead avoiding work as usual, while expending vast amounts of effort ensuring that nobody else can get to work either
- Andrew Nicholls, Ely ,England, 01/09/2009 12:37
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There are many who have been predicting this for some time, and it is certainly not scaremongering.
We needed to start building new nuclear power stations ten years ago, but NuLiebour decided to stick to its twisted political dogma instead. We hould also be taking advantage of the massive coal reserves under our feet, building small local generating plants to minimise energy loss through transforming and transmission.
The green lobby might want to see a return to some kind of pre-industrial stone-age existence (which would be unsustainable given our bloated population), but I do not and I suspect that I am far from being alone.
- Keith Lonsdale, Doncaster, 01/09/2009 11:10
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how about turning out all the lights in Westminster for a start?
- Marianne, SW France/London, 01/09/2009 10:57
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If we get all the workshy benefit scroungers out of their houses and into a job, that'll save the vast amount of energy expended by them watching Jeremy Kyle and Bargain Hunt!
- Jock, London, 01/09/2009 10:25
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I know, let's get even more people to come to this country and build even more and more houses. Being the most densely populated country in Europe is not good enough.
Infrastructure? Electricity, water, schools, hospitals, etc, etc, who needs them? Come to Britain our government are mugs.
- Frank, Home Counties, England., 01/09/2009 09:07
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This is just propaganda - scaremongering - to frighten us all into accepting new nuclear and coal-fired power stations and ignoring Labour and Tories dismal records and policies on reducing energy consumption and increasing energy efficiency. Expect more of the same.
- Austen, London, 01/09/2009 08:52
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So, "Demand for electricity from homes and businesses is set to exceed the available supply within eight years".
What was that again we heard last week about our "new citizens" breeding like rabbits being a Good Thing?
A note to our "representatives" in Westminster (Please read carefully): PEOPLE use energy, therefore the more PEOPLE you have, the more energy you need.
- Croyboy, Croydon, 01/09/2009 08:10
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Why cannot the Wombles of Westminster do anything right?
Time to invest in a tribe of gloworms!!
- Reuben Camara, Morecambe Compound, EUSSR, 01/09/2009 07:39
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