- This topic is empty.
-
Posts
-
Michael, thanks for that response.
There is something very significant that the Westminster government could do to decrease emissions, which is to control the financial institutions. From memory, Britain makes about 1% of emissions, but British institutions fund 15% of global fossil fuel extraction.
Did you know that China is licensed to extract in the North Sea? By law, “British” fossil fuels do not belong to Britain; they belong to the company that extracts them. They are sold on the global market, and the money goes to the company, not to Britain.
Multinational companies now have more power than most governments. That is why democracy no longer works.
“Britain makes about 1% of emissions, but British institutions fund 15% of global fossil fuel extraction.”
That´s where discussions should start.
But instead society is infighting about its car policies in a country (Germany) which is built on selling cars.
Now you have those cars that drive 200 mph, in the city going 20mph.
I am faster on my bike.
The apparent madness is not being solved. Instead city administrations are working with punishment logic as if that would turn car owners into users of public transport at a time where public transport is breaking down.
Remember Craig´s Germany-trip 2 years ago. When he complained about German trains. It hasn´t improved.
But what is the new debt used for – tanks, fighter planes, missiles.
And more cars!
500 Billion Euros. Imagine what you could do with that.
Or the 1 Trillion in Europe. A EU-wide high-velocity train system for starters.
Well, look at China…
It´s beyond words.Heathrow
Clark, where my daughter lives, they have a huge sub station.
It has three routes in and three routes out.
We think this means it is fed from three different power stations. The three routes out go to different towns.
I think that is resilience.
Mind you if the whole plant cracks off, that is a different kettle of fish.
They have just installed a massive battery bank, (very noisy)they are also talking of having a solar farm, adjacent.Any way, why would Heathrow be just supplied from one, modest sub station?
I have cycled past that on the Grand union Canal, it is very old, it could be as old as Heathrow, itself but Heathrow now has five terminals.
If a new runway is constructed, so they can increase flights by 1/3
much more reliable electrical supply, will have to be connected.I initially thought it odd that Heathrow didn’t have it’s own backup supply to continue operating in the event of a power out given its super-critical importance.
However, given that it would take enormous amounts of power to continue its operations could it justify the investment in standby power generation that would likely be used once every 30 years or more.
I fell all that they can reasonably be expected to do is maintain flight operations until all planes that can’t otherwise be diverted etc can land safely.
After that, well tough shit really for the 2 or 3 days of disruption. It’s a first world problem. You can’t mitigate every problem especially one that happens very rarely.It has three routes in and three routes out.
We think this means it is fed from three different power stations. The three routes out go to different towns.
I think that is resilience.Wot happens if that substation has a problem? Can the three power stations send their power a different route? Etc etc.
Grids are difficult to manage. The power grid is possibly the most complex machine humanity has devised yet.
I might have posted a link to “Practical Engineering” on utube before but there’s a whole playlist of videos on the grid available. Imho they are very informative.
I wonder if the supply links to the three power distribution centres are ok as long as they all are working, but the failure of one puts a 33% increase on the demands of the other two, and it is here where the system fails?
If the second transformer supply fails then 66% extra demand falls on the third supply which will fail also.
It looks like Heathrow shutting down was a Heathrow management decision and wasn’t only based on the initial power outage due to the substation fire.
https://archive.is/FaCDl
It seems they could have got power from other substations.
I guess we’ll hear more as time goes on.Quote BBC
“Questioned on whether she remained confident in the decision making of Heathrow’s management on BBC Breakfast, Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander noted that the airport “is a private company”.She added: “The individuals who need to ask themselves whether they have full confidence in Heathrow management are the Heathrow board.”
Simon Gallagher, managing director of UK Network Services, a consultancy specialising in power grids, said every airport in the UK had the same “vulnerability” to National Grid faults.
He said that a data centre near Heathrow entirely backs up its power sourcing, and that it was a “fair question to ask” why the airport had not been protected in the same way.
“It’s a hard argument to make to say that data centres are more important than Heathrow,” Mr Gallagher told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cdjy4m0n1exoI think there is some buck passing, going on.
However, I have also been thinking about data centers.
One has just been constructed in my town, they will not tell you who they are, the fortifications are unreal, as rigorous as AWE. Counter-Terrorism
We work with the Government to protect our country from radiological and nuclear threats
https://www.awe.co.uk/what-we-do/national-security/
It has been suggested by locals that it is Amazon but not parcels. Something to do with secret government.
Anyway, because one data ceter was allowed to be constructed, others have tried to get located to our town.
They are not going to be allowed, there is not enough electricity available.So, as we move forward with new runways, new electrical technologies, like electric cars, electric railways, electric steel making, we are going to be rather short of electricity.
Currently we get about 20% of the electricity we use from interconnectors.
Should we rely of that level of electricity coming in from abroad?The Great Grid Upgrade (TGGU)
https://www.nationalgrid.com/electricity-transmission/network-and-infrastructure/infrastructure-projects/north-london-reinforcement/latest-updates/north-london-reinforcement-project-octoberThey are still imagining that the U.K. will be 95% green in four years time ( Electrical Supply)
15th January 2025 – Infrastructure
The North London Reinforcement project (NLR) kicked off in October, bringing together National Grid, contractors, and external partners to discuss how to make the project a success and continue to deliver The Great Grid Upgrade (TGGU).
Quote
“Contractors and partners including Murphys and Arup, along with Lee Valley Regional Park, attended NLR’s official launch day in October to kickstart the over 40km project that will see the reconductoring for overhead lines between Pelham and Hackney.NLR is the first of 26 Accelerated Strategic Transmission Investment (ASTI) projects to enter construction at National Grid. NLR will play a significant part in TGGU, which will strive to meet the UK Government’s plans to power all homes and businesses with green energy by 2030.”
95% green in four years is not going to happen in the UK.
There are too many variables, like the inconsistency of wind and sushine. Presumably they are taking nuclear as ‘green’? Which is a great stretch of the imagination.
Even today, gas is providing over 30% of UK electricity demand. And that would be higher if we were not importing over 6GW of electricity from Europe (about 15% of demand).
Some antidemocratic moves happening in Turkey.
Erdogan has locked up the Mayor of Istanbul, his university have revoked his degree?
If you have not got a proven higher education, you will not be allowed to stand for election to be president.
Incredibly high inflation in Turkey.
So far over 1300 protesters have been arrested, they are being intimidated by arms of The State.
Erdogan, is of course the backer and motivator of the recent taking of Syria by a bunch of Islamists, who recently slaughtered a lot of the previous presidents supporters.
I would guess, Turkey is on its way to
“Regime Change”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cqlywl04pkloOnce the BBC start to question your behaviour, you know the U.K. State has already tipped the BBC the wink.
Michael, a slight correction. You wrote:
– “Erdogan, is of course the backer and motivator of the recent taking of Syria by a bunch of Islamists, who recently slaughtered a lot of the previous presidents supporters.”
The Salafist forces (or “moderate rebels” in Centrist NATO Orwellian language) have been massacring Alawites and Christians, whether supporters of the former Ba’athist government, opponents of it, neutral, uninvolved civilians, or women and children. But that is what Salafists do; they kill anyone they wish, merely for not being Sunni. And that is why NATO should never have supported them.
Salafism is the politico-religious ideology of the Gulf Monarchies, the West’s allies in the Middle East, and Salafist religious killers have been sent to attack Ba’athist government forces (e.g. Iraq, Libya, Syria) since the Quincy Agreement of 1945:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Quincy_(CA-71)#The_Quincy_Agreement
The Western powers support this because Ba’athist governments wouldn’t let Western companies extract and sell their fossil fuels. So the Western companies had the Western governments send their militaries, their secret services and their Salafist allies to overthrow them. This is a very consistent pattern, e.g. in 1953, BP had MI6 and the CIA overthrow the Iranian government to turn Iran back into a monarchy, because the Iranian Prime Minister was about to nationalise Iran’s oil:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953_Iranian_coup
For a bit more history, see also Noam Chomsky:
https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2011/9/29/is-the-world-too-big-to-fail
– Despite all the changes since, there is every reason to suppose that today’s policy-makers basically adhere to the judgment of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s influential advisor A.A. Berle that control of the incomparable energy reserves of the Middle East would yield “substantial control of the world.” And correspondingly, that loss of control would threaten the project of global dominance that was clearly articulated during World War II, and that has been sustained in the face of major changes in world order since that day.
This again illustrates that the fossil fuel industry is very close to the warmongers, e.g. look up Lord Walney, designer of our new draconian protest laws (I have friends doing up to five years, just for talking). But you’ll find your contrarian physicist that you “have a lot of time for” (I forget his name) in the same camp; check out the think tank he was associated with, before and after it split into two parts, presumably to make the connection less glaringly obvious.
Things are fooking up real fast now; the UK, the USA and Israel have been practising a joint attack on Iran. I’m sure Iran’s oil is merely coincidental, eh?
The more non-depleting, non-imported energy sources these islands have, the less exposed I’ll feel. So I’m not objecting to the pylons they want to build just down the road.
