Britain should shelve plans for a nuclear revival and fast-track proposals for new gas-fired power stations, a leading energy industry boss has warned. Keith Anderson, chief corporate officer of ScottishPower, of the six big energy providers, said that government policy was failing to deliver urgently needed investment in new conventional power stations, putting the country at risk of price rises and power cuts. He said that the UK system was becoming increasingly unstable after the loss of big coal-fired power plants, which have been the backbone of the country’s electricity supply for more than a century. “As a country we have been saying we are committed to new nuclear for ten years. How long is [Hinkley Point] going to take to come through? Let’s get on and build what we know how to build. The risk is we are sitting here in five years’ time and we have not built anything.” He expressed concern that at a time of considerable political uncertainty linked to Brexit, the UK was also facing an energy crunch. “As an economy we should be taking control of our own energy supply,” he said, pointing out that last winter the gap between peak demand and supply fell to its lowest level in ten years.
Times 20th July 2016 read more »