And now brace yourself for an ice age

deckingman

I didn't say we should not have "Green" taxes. If you read my posts properly, you'll see that my point was specifically about the effect that taxing fuel has on prices in general, and that some of the extra revenue generated should be used to provide a decent state pension so that these people can afford to pay the higher prices. Without that, the only option for some of these elderly people is to either freeze or starve. Maybe that's OK with you though.....

MikeTV

But it's very easy to come up with reasons not to introduce taxes, and if we adopt that approach, nothing will change. But I agree with you that if we do go down the taxes route, we will need to provide credits for those least able to afford it.

It will have implications across the economy. But the hope is that other nations will follow our lead, through treaties and negotiations, which will help level the economic playing field.

Wild Weasel

LOL. Meanwhile... in the real world.

Wild Weasel

Which we'll all have time to contemplate, sitting in the dark some day if this insanity continues.

Wind farms produced 'practically no electricity' during Britain's cold snap - Telegraph

DPinBucks

That report is seriously skewed, stupid, ignorant and irresponsible. And that’s the good bits.Nobody is saying that renewables (wind, tide, hydroelectric, solar) are the total answer to energy production in the UK. They can only ever be part of the solution.There are nowhere near enough wind farms yet to provide an infrastructure capable of withstanding local and/or temporary blips.The UK is one of the windiest places on earth. However, even when every mooted windmill has been built, there will still be (very rare) occasions when the wind doesn’t blow anywhere across the country.The tides will still operate; the sun will still shine (possibly!), rivers will still flow. And power stations (fossil fuelled for the time being; nuclear eventually) will still churn it out.Every watt generated by the wind, no matter when, is a watt of fossil fuel generation saved.

simonoaks

really, haven't seen much of that in the last 10 years. You can't have a tax-and-spend policy without the tax part.

deckingman

Not quite. In energy (or CO2 terms) you have to first pay back the cost of maintenance and repair (as well as the initial build and installation). Just substitute money with energy (or CO2) and you'll get the idea. Before you can make a profit (produce more energy than you've spent) you have to get a return on the initial (fixed) build cost. After that, you then have to deduct the ongoing maintenance and repair costs before you start to make a "profit" (in this case, produce more energy from wind than has been expended from fossil fuels).

You also have to factor in the fact, when idle, wind turbines actualy consume electricity so, if this hasn't been derived from renewables, then this is using more fossil fuel which has to be "paid back" when the farm is producing. The consumer magazine "Which" did a trial on a "Home Owner" type turbine and found that after a year, it had actually consumed more electricity than it had produced.

Wild Weasel

These bird shredder 'wind farms' are a complete con. They're a bloody eyesore too.

DPinBucks

And why don't those same considerations apply to any other form of energy production?

By " ... produce more energy from wind than has been expended from fossil fuels" I assume you mean " ... than has been expended from [using] fossil fuels to build the plant"? Obviously there is a transition phase, but after that the energy cost of building a renewable energy plant comes itself from renewables or nuclear.
Really? How? Why? And how much? And, again, why wouldn't it itself be derived from renewables (or nuclear)?

DPinBucks

Well, there you go.  I didn't know that before.

That settles that question.