Protest

Protest is a democratic right, one which must be protected if this country isn't going to go to the dogs. Whilst there is always the scope for the protesters to turn against democracy we have to assume that it is a remote possability.

We also have to assume that the government will do little more than take note of the protests - if government policy was just dictated by protesters we'd live in a very poor society indeed, with no planning beyond the immediate term.

So here's the thing - how do you police protests at power stations?

Power stations, by their nature are strategic assets of national importance. Turn them off and large swathes of the country can easily be blacked out with the local economy shutting down for a few hours. Continue the theme with regular blackouts and people will start loosing their jobs. Not pretty.
It's little surprise, therefore, that the police have been accussed of being heavy handed - after all they need to protect millions of people against the posibility that there are a few nutters in the croud who are there just to cause disruption.

Yes, people are entitled to peaceful protest - but you have to realise that with so many people seemingly willing to cross the moral line the police do have little choice but to assume that everyone out to cause as much trouble as possible - even if the demonstration is billed as peaceful.

Sadly, that includes kids.

A new coal fired power station

According to Reuters construction is due to begin on a new 600MW ultra super critical coal fired power station.

The ultra super critical refers to the steam temperature and pressure - ie very high temperatures and pressures.
This increases the efficiency of the plant - so it will emit less CO2 than it did previously.

This increase in efficiency is not enough to justify its presence - the potential for CCS retrofit must exist. I've not looked into whether (or not) it does.

Completion is scheduled for 2012. This will also be a baseload plant (guarenteed to run all the time) which means that it does a job which renewables cannot do.
Nuclear, however, could.

Obama

As the whole waking world must know Barack Obama has been elected as the 44th President of the United States.

Awsome.

His victory speech is inspiring stuff.

What does he plan on coal?

Well, according to his website, the democrats will deploy five full scale carbon capture and storage enable plants.
This is in addition to implementing an 80% emission reduction program by 2050.

That's great news.

Even better news is the 1 million plug in hybrids that are sought.

I have to say that this morning, I'm feeling rather pleased.

Students saying no

According to the the coal hole students at Imperial recently protested to Eon at a recruitment event.

I also heard this - after reading Felix (the student newspaper of Imperial College). It took place whilst I was in Nepal, otherwise I may have gone down to ask Eon for a job - and been there whilst the 'protest' took place.

I can't find the story on Felixonline, but I gather that it was a sort of hippy-love-in-fest, with a guitar playing fellow running the show.
Somewhat sadly for the legitimacy of the protest the guitar playing fellow wasn't a student, and was promptly removed by security.

Or so I'm told.

Coal in the UK

Some patient soul has put together a map of all current and proposed power stations and coal mines.

They must have the patience of a saint.

Sadly they've not included the research centre's (and there are quite a number of them), so it's not quite a complete list of all the UK jobs that depend on coal - a close second though!

Feed in tarriff's

Whilst I've been away a lot of interesting things have been happening - mainly centered around the creation of DECC (although that website still needs a bit of work!).

Included within the changes being proposed is the inclusion of feed in tarriffs. Here electricity suppliers are told that, for every MWh of electricity they generate, they will receive a fixed subsidy (in addition to the revenue they receive from the generated electricity).
The current scheme is more complicated and as such cannot give a clear price as to the level of subsidy which it will provide.

Generally I think that feed in tarriffs are seen as more efficient (at getting renewables created) than ROCs. They may also be cheaper.

So far the statement by Miliband on an amendment to include feed in tarriffs requires that such tarriffs will only apply to the smallest (probably domestic) generators.

Extending this concept, sweeping the renewables obligation away and replacing it with a system of feed in tarriffs may be a good idea, increasing the rate at which renewables are deployed in the country, but it may destroy any investor confidence which still exists.

Nepal

I've just spent the last three weeks kayaking in Nepal. It's been great fun, and a bit of an eye opener.

Nepal is a third world country, and is not as well off as India. It felt as though tourism keeps the country going. I know that there have been some political problems there recently, but I have to say that we only encountered friendship (unless money was involved when people generally did anything to get as much as possible).
I'd love to go back.

Nepal generates some of its power with hydroelectric dams. Since the monsoon has just about ended there is still plenty of water in the rivers and the dams are generating plenty of juice. As the season progresses they will generate less and less.
I'm not sure if Nepal has any back-up generation - I guess that it must.

I do know that it is reliant upon India for much of its electricity. I know this because in one particular town (Dumre) the electricity clicked off every evening between around 6 and 9pm.
When we asked why we were told "India". Essentially India reduces the electricity it sends to Nepal during these hours - it needs it for its own population. Nepal reacts the only way in which it can, by cutting people off.
The larger buildings had their own generators, but most people just lit candles.

This, of course, is just after the monsoon, when the dams are generating at near their maximum capacity. Things can only get worse.

How does this relate to coal? Directly, it doesn't.

It does suggest to me though that the need in Nepal for electricity is greater than the need to reduce emissions (after all Nepal is a developing nation and must be permitted to increase its emissions).
Given the option (which may not exist for coal since they only have small coal [lignite] deposits) I would expect them to build a power station whenever possible.

What I'm saying is this - coal can be part of the problem or part of the solution. If we, as rich western nations, take no action and leave it all to the poorer countries in the world it will probably become part of the problem.

That is why I support Kingsnorth.