Power To The People

Categories: uncategorized

Date: 12 July 2006 14:27:39

We are endeavouring to release Dith Nav 1.1. This is a slightly smaller and more compact version. However we appear to be having trouble in reducing the size at present.

Today I am reflecting on the government's Energy Policy announced yesterday.

I appreciate their desire to raise the energy created from renewables to 20% by 2020. I acknowledge their desire to reduce our dependence on imported fuels and understand the problems they face in doing that. I can even accept that we need to look seriously at the future of nuclear power.

What is vexing me is the decision that the public will no longer allowed to object to the siting of wind farms and nuclear power stations. Objection that have been valid in the past, such as necessity or safety, will be disallowed. Therefore we'll have next to no rights. Yet we supposedly live in a democracy.

In Wales they are looking at harnessing the tidal power of the Severn estuary. A scheme has been "floated" to build a barrage across the Severn from Lavernock to Brean Down, near Weston Super Mare. This would provide up to 5% of the UK's energy needs. However to build it would have a major impact on the environment along the Severn.

As such various groups have protested to the Assembly that such a project would damage the local environment and put the breeding grounds of various water fowl in danger. Many of the mudflats are listed as Areas of Special Scientific Interest. So here we have a instance where the "Green" alternative to energy production could endanger the very environment that it should protect.

There are less obstrusive options, such as tidal bays that would have a much lower impact. Yet these are not of the grand design that politicians tend to love. I'm sure we're all looking forward to the days when a visit to the seaside will show vistas of wind farms on the horizons.

Yet what of the government's favoured option, nuclear power? Is this really the clean, safe alternative that the Grinning Baffoon will have us believe?

It is definitely safer than it was. The generating power is greenhouse friendly. Yet the waste is still not safe to dispose of. There is the alternative of nuclear fusion, which would be cleaner, safer and with very little waste. Here governments are just not investing enough into its research and development. They are more interested in arguing over where the testing should be done than actually doing anything.

Somehow the government has also decided that the building of all nuclear stations will be funded by private companies, without government subsidy. Do they really think that the private sector will take all the risks? In previous examples of private involvement in government ordered projects the government has been only to happy to say this but to bend over backwards when the private sector refuse to do it.

Just look at our new schools and hospitals as examples.