Decentralised Energy

A year late - the government announced the results of their review of climate change initiatives today and told us what we already knew. They are not going to meet their targets. But instead of taking this opportunity to put in place measures that would really make a difference to reduce climate damaging emissions, they've lowered their expectations.

It's the capital of the UK, the biggest energy demand centre in the country and the largest city in Europe. And it can slash its CO₂emissions, gas consumption and reliance on fossil fuels without nuclear power.

The UK will shortly become a net importer of gas, as the North Sea fields which have given us over 20 years of self-sufficiency finally begin to run dry; production is decreasing so that we are now a net importer, rather than a net exporter. The recent attempt by the Russian Government, Europe's major gas supplier, to hike the price of the gas it supplies to neighbouring Ukraine (the first step on the pipeline route to Western Europe) has led to intense media speculation over the security of supplies to the UK - in effect the argument is that since we cannot rely on a stable supply of gas, we should press ahead with a new generation of nuclear power plants which would guarantee energy security.