was the witch wrong….
carbon capture fuelled by yorkshire coal mines???

As successive Governments have ignored long term fuel security, investment in renewables and wasted North sea oil and gas we'll have to turn to whatever we can get our hands on to keep warm and generate electricity. But I wonder who'll be tough enough to go down the mines?

was the witch wrong….

How could the witch have been wrong ?

British workers were shafted, and her money-grabbing friends were handsomely rewarded.

A perfect plan, flawlessly executed imo.

I think carbon capture and 'clean coal' technology is to be trialled at Longannet Power Station in Fife.

Is it correct also that the coal we import en masse now is of poorer quality and worse for the environment than British coal? Sure I read that somewhere.

Sorry, thought you meant Blair Witch!

Maybee Maggie was just forward thinking…stuffing the miners in the 1980's to leave the coal for 2020 when we need it? Nah!

Would this be politically acceptable considering the current push specifically in the reduction of carbon emissions?
http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2009/07/uk-announces-long-term-carbon-reduction-and-renewables-strategies
Are we now confident in carbon capture and storage and is the direction that we want to go in?
I'm not sure that digging into the ground for our energy is anything more than a (very) short term answer.
Sorry, lots of questions and very few answers.

wind power and all the soft options like it will never happen.
the pits will be open within the next 10/15 years….

Is it only me that believes carbon capture to be a complete fantasy ?

Is it only me that believes carbon capture to be a complete fantasy ?

In a world awash with conspiracy theories, that's really quite impossible.

btw, who captured the carbon in the coal …….. was it God ?

Fact is we're making long term plans for "clean coal" before it's ever been effectively tested in the real world… Carbon capture's not really a proven tech on industrial scales.

TBH I think we should stop ****ing about and build a couple of modern nuclear plants, to tide us over til we have a better idea.

"TBH I think we should stop ****ing about and build a couple of modern nuclear plants, to tide us over til we have a better idea"

Plus a few big tidal barrages should do it

The thing with CO2 is, it wants to be a gas at ordinary temperatures and pressures, and you either have to store it in an unstable state or react it with something that takes energy to produce, and we shouldn't lose sight of the fact that CO2 capture is also oxygen capture. We have a more pressing need for oxygen…

We have a more pressing need for oxygen…

I never realised we had a shortage of that ………. no **** has told me 😐

When the **** do we ran out ? 😯

Nuclear power is the future.

Theres no way we can harvest enough natural resources to make renewables and biomass work for the entire country, and arent they barking up the wrong tree anyway, surely wave and water power is more constant than wind.

Either way this country is screwed, no money, no power, and no bollocks, we cant even stop a socially disabled hacker from being extradited but we can send a convicted terrorist home to die?

Yes, that's certainly relevant to the question of sustainable power 😕

we cant even stop a socially disabled hacker from being extradited but we can send a convicted terrorist home to die?

I never thought of it that like.

But yes, of course, you're right …………….. obviously the answer must be "nuclear power" then.

Yet again, the wisdom of STW sorts out a tricky little conundrum for me.

Nuclear is the only short to medium term answer, but I have more faith in engineers than to think we will be reliant on it forever.
We need to rethink the way we live and use energy just as much as looking for new ways to harness it.

I'm currently working in relation to carbon capture at longannet and it is very interesting, but my god does it cost a lot! It could be the future and currently being looked at by china and their new coal powerstations.

There is currently a consortium looking into going Nuclear but the problems now are pressure groups and planning permission. CCS and nuclear look very promising.

Theres no way we can harvest enough natural resources to make renewables and biomass work for the entire country, and arent they barking up the wrong tree anyway, surely wave and water power is more constant than wind.

Either way this country is screwed, no money, no power, and no bollocks, we cant even stop a socially disabled hacker from being extradited but we can send a convicted terrorist home to die?

Initially I couldn't work out how your second paragraph fitted in with what this thread is discussing. But then It came to me: Wind power.

Nuclear power. Just get on with it.

Nuclear, yes. Unfortunately, this is still a finite resource – one day the uranium will run out. Perhaps we'll be lucky and discover it on Mars before that happens, but I wouldn't hold your breath.

Wind and wave power won't do it – there are simply TOO MANY PEOPLE.

What we need to do is stop having children until the population levels out to a sustainable figure. Given that it's humans we're talking about, I can't see that happening.

At the risk of resurrecting an old forum thread:

We're all doomed.

Probably best to kick back, relax and have beer. Bugger all else to be done, I'm afraid. 😈

The increasngly established view is that an energy mix is needed.

We have 15% of Europe's coastline. Offshore wind is good, though enormously expensive to build and run. We also have the problem that the combined 33GW promised by the Crown Estate's rouns 1, 2 and (now) 3 zone allocaitons are still so far behind.

Wave and tidal suffered massively in the 70s and 80s as the oil industry was efectively over subsidised. These technologies are being developed much more, but the economic situation makes funding for new technologies almost impossible right now.

Wind is good, but it is only 20-40% efficient, so even if we did install all 33GW offshore, we'd probably only get up to 13-ish GW. Not enlough.

The Kingsnorth decision means that, even if CCS never worked, the existing – and somewhat old, inefficientr and knackered – Kingsnorth power stattion will continue to be run. This is an own goal by the environmental lobby.

It also means that out continued rreliance on Russian gas – yes, we are reliant on it – has effectively increased. Given the issues they have in Eastern Europe with this, it's our turn next. Norway can't supply what we need.

Nuclear is a difficult one. If we leave aside the massive CO2 output from construction, then it is "clean". Until we consider (a) uranium is not a renewable source and (b) there is the small matter of waste disposal.

It's interesting also the the convepts of energy security (great rhetoric, last really prevalent in the 70s) and the energy "island" have come about again.

Anyway, the Tories (assuming they will be the next govt) are apparently (according to an insider I spoke with on Thursday) are going to publish their policy statement by Christmas. Look out for this….

OMITN (wondering whether being a renewable energy lawyer might be worth sticking with, after all)

I think we should take lots of electric cars, and put them on treadmills, and use that to run generators. Because EVERYONE knows that electric cars don't create any pollution or use any fossil fuels. Voila! Carbon cycle closed.

hugely expensive unproven technology to remove co2 from the waste gasses, or just plant lots of fast growing trees/crops e.g. willow and bury it in a hole. does the same thing at a fraction of cost and will work with no unforseen problems. removing sulphur etc is a diff problem.
wind power etc is a dead end unless we find a way to store the power they make, a return to the kind of hydroelectric dams that where fashionable in the 60's would be good. use the power from the wind farms to pump water back into the reso that can then be used anytime it is needed to make electricity.
we also need nuclear and soon or we will all be having a rather cold and dark old age.

waffling on about co2 is a bad diversion, we are going to be out of cheap fuel before long and that will have a far greater impact on our pampered selves and our way of life than "global warming" ever will.

I can't be bothered to contribute to this thread other than to point people again at David Mackay's book, which you can read for free on the Internet. in short, numbers are important.

Hopefully now he's been appointed chief scientific advisor to the department of energy we might have a bit less short term thinking on government – though I doubt it personally with the current encumbent at number 10.

we might have a bit less short term thinking on government

Why would you expect that ? No government is seriously going to think much beyond the next general election.
It's in the nature of our political system ……. planning for say fifty years time, makes no sense at all.

Short termism, and worrying about winning the next election, is what it's all about.

in short, numbers are important

how so. i know 3 is the magic number and one is the loneliest does anyone else have any number related statements they would like to share 😉

We need bigger dynamos on our bikes or solar panels on the roof.

Nuclear is woefully not environmentally friendly on any level – in terms of green house gasses it is plain scary. The CO2 from construction of a plant is massive. The CO2 from the mining and refining is massive. Then there is the small matter of CFCs which are a byproduct of enrichment and make CO2 look like a non-issue in the greenhouse gas world.

People say that renewables aren't an option because they can't meet current demand for power… noshit. How about we stop wasting so much **** power and start living with a smaller energy footprint. True the nature of renewables means that we need to look at a mixed bag of technologies to ensure that there is energy available to meet demands at any time (wind is a bit of a pain in that it only works when the wind is blowing… and tidal has this issue of happening only twice a day, but at least it is predicible and certain!). We should be investing in more hydro (which will really get on the tits of the NIMBYS when valleys have to be flooded), wave, tidal, wind, solar (especially solar thermal).

Alas governments are only elected for 5 years at a time so only need to think short term. So we are all screwed.

We should be investing in more hydro (which will really get on the tits of the NIMBYS when valleys have to be flooded)

unfortunately in tropical regions the carbon released in dam flooding can be greater than that ever saved by the water 🙁

I was really talking about the UK perspective rather than globally. The technology that suits one part of the world may not suit another… for example other parts of the world can do a lot more with solar technology than we can… or perhaps look into Kaplan turbines in the large, slow moving, rivers.

Horses for courses and all that 😉

the soloution lies beneath our feet……

What… geothermal 😉

tidal has this issue of happening only twice a day

But it doesn't though, does it ? Tidal movement is constantly happening. So I've never really understood out why if a barrier was built which allowed turbines to turn as the tide came in, why turbines wouldn't then turn as the dammed water was expelled when the tide went out again. OK there might be a short period of equilibrium, but surely that wouldn't be for very long.

It's a genuine question btw. Obviously I'm missing something in the logistics otherwise it would have been done, but I can't figure out what it is 😕

To be fair I am not entirely sure on the dynamics of tidal turbines so don't know whether they do work on the inbound and outbound tide or just one way as it were. I think I heard that they basically are only operational twice a day, but could have been pissed during that lecture 😉

I was more interested in converting water pumps into hydro turbines, which effectivly works by running the things backwards.

OK there might be a short period of equilibrium, but surely that wouldn't be for very long.

and for that matter demand is cyclical – there's already talk of intelligent load shedding where less essential stuff is turned off externally in exchange for a cheaper tariff

Or power generated when there is no demand for electricity could be used to generate hydrogen, which could then be used to fuel cars, or burned/used in micro CHP set ups for power. Seems a great way to up the efficiency of wind turbines to me.

I just don't agree with the nuclear option, even if I did write an essay on how it was a great option and then defended it in a presentation, but that was more to go through the exercise of trying to put across a rather unsavory idea to a whole bunch of hippies than anything else 😉

don't know whether they do work on the inbound and outbound tide or just one way

But water movement is water movement surely. So if technically turbines can't work both ways, then you just need to have another set of turbines facing the other way. It's actually something which has been bugging me for a while – all that massive tidal/ocean power kindly provided to us by the moon, it tears away at land masses destroying coast lines, and yet to can't be harnessed to generate electricity 😕

That is a damn good point.

Tidal does make a lot of sense to me. Just a shame that no one is willing to invest in it properly. They are/were talking about a tidal barrage across Morecambe bay a while back that would power 25% of the north west of England… whether it will come to anything or not I don't know though (the environmental lobby don't like it, partially I suspect as they want to put a road and rail link over it to improve communications links between west Cumbria and Lancashire. Which would be magnificent for the region financially…)

the environmental lobby don't like it

with anything that is being proposed the NIMBY's and greens wont be happy. wind farms spoil the look of the countryside, tidal **** up estuaries and bays, hydro will kill the valleys, nuclear are you mental!
we have built our mostly nice society on free energy we just have to dig up or put a pipeline into, that is running out and we will be screwed fairly soon unless we do something.
from what i have read we are past the peak for fossil fuels and the price will continue to incease with decreasing availability, this is going to cause a lot of problems for our fat assed tesco dependent lives.

even if the actual resource is not depleted they are mostly controlled by other countries, most of our gas comes from russia via a number of other countries can you see them going cold and dark before us?
it wont be long before coal mining is a job option in britain again.

on a side note scargill started an illegal strike that none repeat none of the miners where allowed to vote in. the tories actually offered them a never before heard of conditions and pay increase that scargill dismissed out of hand, no voting whatsoever by its members. he should have noted what thatcher done to the argies over a very small useless bunch of islands thousands of miles away.
she was/is a mad b'stard but she was in a position to stamp on anyone that annoyed her and she did. (argies, miners, iranians etc)

How about we stop wasting so much **** power and start living with a smaller energy footprint

I like. Who the **** needs a 100A supply into their house? Limit it to 40A and make people chose how to use their energy.
The manner in which we produce energy is no more important than the manner in which we use it.