The island of Jersey gets 95% of its electricity via cables from France. The latest post-Brexit fishing dispute got so hot so fast, that a French minister even suggested cutting off the electricity if they didn’t get their way. 60 French fishing vessels were protesting at slow licensing. But naval ships from both sides were even called in to patrol the area, the situation has been defused.
Surely the UK government must be working out that electricity supply is a major tool for foreign disputes. Currently about 10% of the UK electricity comes in via undersea cables*, but that is set to rise to 25%, according to the Daily Mail. Surely alarms are ringing? This is not even the first time this outrageous threat was made. Macron himself threatened it last October too. See “Hands Up! Your money or your Fish!“
There is a very uneasy power balance here: The right to fish in British waters is worth about 650 million euros to EU fishermen, but European energy markets were worth up to £2.3 billion for the UK.
Not only does it leave the UK in a weaker negotiation position, but a selfish foreign player could also ambiguously twist the knife with well timed, deniable, cable accidents costing millions of dollars and wreaking havoc. A blackout in 2017 left many travellers trapped in underground train systems for hours, with many resorting to mobile phone “torches” to find their way out. Chaos.
Smart political players lecture gullible patsies on setting “net zero” targets to change the weather, while making sure they use nuclear power or just repeatedly fail to meet their own targets.
In this case both leaders are playing a popular vote-winning card for their domestic audiences. There is a lot of puffery theater going on. But underneath that are very real vulnerabilities that will matter when things unravel due to pandemics, wars or economic crashes.
Who knows, what if a third party submarine decided to target those cables? Could they get away with that in the Channel? Greater military minds than I will know more about what’s possible with submarines in the Channel — remembering that it doesn’t need to be a big sub to damage a power cable, or perhaps, even a sub. How about fishing boats, anchors or divers?
h/t GWPF
UK faces electric shock: Jersey fishermen row shows our reliance on Europe for power could land us in big trouble, expert warns
by Harriet Line, UK Daily Mail
Tony Lodge, a research fellow at the Centre for Policy Studies think-tank, said the UK is setting itself up for ‘almighty trouble’ by the end of the decade. He warned that Britain is offshoring its energy security and emissions to Europe, leaving it vulnerable if the Continent’s surplus of power is reduced.
On Tuesday French maritime minister Annick Girardin said Paris would cut off electricity to Jersey – which gets 95 per cent of its power supply from France – if the dispute was not resolved. Mr Lodge yesterday said this had ‘inadvertently exposed’ the ‘very dangerous’ threat of being too reliant on a foreign supplier.
Shutting off electricity to a foreign country is nothing short of international gangsterism. The very idea of it shames a great democratic nation such as France.
It would be a hostile act that would put lives in danger. Without electricity, Jersey’s hospitals and many other vital services would be impaired.
*The UK Daily Mail said “8%” but last October the Times said 10% with a lot more detail. Half of the total incoming supply is from France.
Even so in Oz!
Right now we see the indoctrinated pushing for so-called ‘renewables’ plus batteries to provide power (including for their EVs!) when sheer common sense says that there really is only one way to go!
But, unfortunately this technology will ‘fix’ the non-problem of ‘carbon [sic] emissions’ – and we can’t have that now, can we!
“The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.”
H. L. Mencken
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we see the indoctrinated pushing for so-called ‘renewables’ plus batteries
Try and find out how to get rid of Lithium Battery Power Pack advised by Kogan as Dangerous
Hi, I also received the same email today (I was googling around to see if anyone else is talking about this) and what happened to our power bank is probably the reason for this recall. Around 2 weeks ago, the powerbank exploded while my partner was using it to charge her phone. We managed to put out the fire before it caused any further damage but it’s still kinda scary thinking about what could have happened if the explosion hadn’t been delayed (it gave out warning sound and smoke a min before it exploded) or the fire had caught to nearby electronic stuff. We have been keeping the remains of the cell (that burned) and one that is still intact in water as suggested by a fireman. They came and collected them nearly two weeks later. Even after that much time under water, the battery still started to bubble up a bit and making sizzling sound as soon as I drained the water (my heart almost skipped a beat) so I hastily filled the pot up with water again, tapped it up and handed it to them. It feels like we have been keeping a bomb in our house for the last 2 weeks. We took really good care of the powerbank and so I’m still not sure how all of this happened. Haven’t specifically heard from Kogan again yet since they collected the burned battery. If you still have it at your place may be it’s a good idea to keep them in a safe place separate from flammable materials. I don’t hope for this to happen to anyone who purchased this but it’s better to be safe than sorry.
70
Imagine your house with a Tesla Powerbank
when Tesla batteries can do this to a car – Tesla Model S Burns Down at Supercharger in Norway
60
Just e-bike batteries have destroyed a couple of homes in Sydney.
Back in March
https://www.channelnews.com.au/electric-bike-charger-blamed-for-sydney-townhouse-fire/
A a couple of years ago
https://www.smh.com.au/business/consumer-affairs/an-orange-flash-then-melanie-s-house-burnt-down-20190426-p51hj2.html
40
Yes, you would think that our critical shortage of power would be noticed by the elite and they would be hurrying to build grown up power stations that dont require sacrifices to the Weather Gods to keep them working.
The French have form on this as at the last minute as the Fisheries agreement was being drawn up last December France said they would shut down the interconnectors unless we ceded more fish to them. They also specifically said they would use the same tactics to get their own way when new fishery limits are being negotiated in 5 years time.
The reason the UK is so keen on interconnectors is that so we can export to the continent some of our excess wind power when we have some.
WE urgently need half a dozen nuclear power stations or better yet 10 gas power stations as they are quicker to build. Instead, no doubt, a country with only some 1650 hours of sun a year will build more solar panels and back that up with wind farms which frequently don’t turn when needed most.
Instead we shall relpy on a nation determnined to trip us up aided and abetted by the EU who are determined to do everytng they can to precent our future success as that would endure a stady stream of countries wanting to leave their unopleasant gang
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The Ruskies have their hands on the gas pipeline valves and le Frogs have their fingers on the undersea trip switches, what could possibly go wrong.
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More threats from the French linking two totally separate subjects -fishing and Financial services
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9575005/Furious-Number-10-blasts-EU-post-Brexit-fishing-row.html
The good news is that UK exports to the EU have returned to where they were pre brexit whilst EU exports to the UK have fallen off a cliff despite our waiving checks and tariffs they imposed on our goods from January 1st
That drop will affect many thousands of European businesses as Britain buys what it needs from elsewhere. The EU never seemed to realise that their exports were at such risk which is strange bearing in mind they sold £100 billion more goods to us each year than we did to them but carried on regardless trying to harass us and cause us pain up until the last moment.
Given the choice I would sooner buy stuff from other parts of the world rather than the EU. Excluding China of course! Aussie wine is on the list. Did the French think there were no other sources of wine than them?
40
The Channel Islands are not under the control of the UK Government, at least in theory, as they report to the Duke of Normandy currently Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth AND Duke of Normandy. A carryover from Medieval times.
The French most likely have singled them out as a week link and as a distraction from problems inside France.
Jersey will have to go back to diesel generators. The UK Goverment will go back to sleep and be caught napping next time the French pull this stunt again.
181
Macron needs a distraction. There have been two open letters, one from retired Generals and one from serving Generals that there is risk of another revolution. He has very little political capital left and le Penn will win the first round in the next presidential elections. Winning the second round is harder.
290
Yes the Queen has many titles and they’re not all useless but maybe it’s time for some pruning.
If she can’t raise a peasant army in Normandy, what’s the point? The title should be retired.
But a better idea would be to confer “Duke of Normandy” on Harry and Meghan, in Los Angeles. A second title will make them super-popular. Hollywood-types love that stuff. The Markles will be more likely to stay in LA, and less likely to return to the UK…. Everyone wins!
And while she’s at it, the Queen could flick a few redundant titles down under – something for Jacinda (maybe Duke of the Scilly Isles) …. and one for Scotty too.
BTW, on the Channel Islands, I back your solution – diesel generators.
And never trust France again, with your critical infrastructure.
30
If you guys ‘n gals do build ’em, make them Liquid Fuel Thorium Reactors. They’re quick to build and very safe. If you use pressure water cooled reactors (same as the dangerous French ones), France will try blockading fuel rods and other silly things.
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sophocles
“They’re quick to build and very safe”
I am pleased to award you a contract for building 5 of these things. Can you have them finished by the start of the winter? We shall sort out the financial details later
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Nope. Building? How old fashioned. Check out Terrestrial Energy. They’re much closer (Canada — just over the pond).
They could just truck the reactors in, while you set up the generators and extend your grid …
Check with Indonesia — they contracted (I think) for one last year or the year before.
With the geomagnetic excursion coming in, I won’t touch anything like a grid. Waste of money, materials and effort. Won’t last.
Best of luck.
20
The UK even had one at the Winfrith Atomic Energy Test Site between 1967 and 1980.
30
Belly button ships. That’s novel. 🙂
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They are going to unscrew them and see what happens if you stand up in a hurry.
University studies infer that your arse falls off……
Maybe the French have something else in mind?
30
I’ve never seen navel ships. I’ve seen navel lint before but not navel ships, how quaint.
30
Yes the Lint-on class vessels, quite useless really, only good for gazing and easy to pick out…….
50
Well spotted, but I think we can forgive Jo for this one – easy to do!
30
You missed “patsy’s” for “patsies”; our charming host has a weakness for fruit shop style plurals.
21
Who needs spelling n@zis.
A question for pedants: Should the full stop be included, or excluded, from the italicised passage?
31
It all depends on whether you’re writing long-hand or belting out typed script on a computer. 🙂
20
Yeah, I was wondering what they connected to.
Any ideas?
10
#5.4.2: That’s navels. A remote reply
to FrankH.
Hanrahan:
consider the difference between italicised non-italicised full stops.
As long as you put them in their correct (or expected) place for sentence closure …
10
I see no difference, but then I’m not a pedant. 😀
00
This is what you get when you allow an unelected green activist, Princess Nut-Nut, to run the country by holding the PM’s balls.
The other point of the problem is the fact there are NO real engineers in parliament or ant of the government departments so there is no push back against the stupidity of using unreliable renewables to run the country.
While I agree with tonyb regarding nuclear power stations there is a problem with that, the regulations about building them is based on the LNT or Linear No Threshold models which are totally ridiculous and out of touch with reality. His point about gas fired units is only valid up to a point – most gas used in the UK originates in Russia and travels by pipeline through Europe so can likewise be shut off. Because the UK government is not allowing fracking, even though there vast amounts under the UK, because some green zealot said there could be earthquakes even though they allow drilling for thermal power which does the same as fracking.
As things stand round the world it is RIP the USA and will soon be RIP the UK, unfortunately Australia is following in their footsteps – are all politicians daft and the populations stupid???
270
Ivan
I cite nuclear and gas fired power stations as they are proven technology and on any one day you know much power you are getting.
WE still get some 45% of our gas from our own fields, some 20% comes from Norway and some 13% comes from LNG so our dependence on Russia is relatively limited,(at present) unlike Germany.
Unlike renewable power a reasonable amount of gas can be stored, so we do have a buffer
The Rolls Royce reactors look to be interesting but they are 10 years down the road. As it stands we need SOMETHING and as that won’t include coal, it will need to be gas, nuclear or a shut down of our economy when the weather gods are displeased with us.
Yes. All politicians are daft and the population stupid. Or at the least the latter don’t realise the problem until it is actually affecting them personally
170
Gas fires up quickly when the sun doesn’t shine and wind doesn’t blow, Australia see it as a transition fuel. Also a cheaper build that coal or nuclear plants.
20
I keep seeing posts from people who don’t know the difference between Open Cycle and Closed Cycle gas plants. Perry Williams who ‘writes’ for The Australian is a continual offender (and Cut & Paster), but I would have expected better from a regular on this blog.
CCGTs run much like coal-fired plants, i.e. slow to start up (as they have to get the boiler going) but capable of generating lots of electricity for extended times at lower running costs.
OCGTs are basically jet engines hooked to a generator. Yes, they are faster to start up and shut down, hence the Greenies term “peaking plants” but they are inefficient hence cost more to run and generate more CO2 emissions. Their maintenance bill is much higher esp. if rapid startup is required (heat stress cracking). When was the last time you got on an aeroplane and had it start engines and up, up, away in a minute?
It is this confusion which is imbedded in the ‘minds’ of politicians along with the delusion that “something new must be better”.
What will NOT happen is that Wind turbines and CCGTs will provide cheaper electricity with low emissions. CCGTs don’t work in combination like that, it was a failure in Ireland and in Germany where several CCGT plants were shut down, and in 2 cases dismantled and moved to countries with policies not based on wishful thinking.
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‘ … but I would have expected better from a regular on this blog.’
Apologies, I’m fairly illiterate on energy matters and normally leave it to my colleagues, but thanks to your short essay I’m now fully informed.
30
Indeed, Richard Owen No.3 has condensed that down brilliantly. I will use that, thank you Richard!
50
But gas as you describe is a band aid on an ailing system.
For decades coal was able to meet demand, 95% predictable, with the help of Wonderful Water™. The same engineers could do the same today if allowed and if allowed to build a dam or two.
00
They have been affected, personally, already. They are just too bluddy dumb to realise it.
70
We know very well that our energy bills have gone up a lot faster than inflation, and why. But in the UK this is not an electoral issue – yet. That will change when power cuts bite, a winter or two down the line, as prices are even higher and still rising. We need a single-issue energy party that will frighten the big parties by taking votes from them even though it is unlikely ever to get elected, just as the single-issue Brexit parties did. In any case, Labour is currently in a possibly historic decline at Westminster.
50
Anton
When we lived in the US a power failure in the middle of winter could be deadly, literally. People in Australia have no idea at all when it goes down to -40 deg C how important heating and power are. And throw non functioning EVs into the mix…
With solar panels covered in snow and windmills frozen or idle and power cuts an almost certainty it will only take a severe incident and, sadly, the many deaths that will result, to force the issue. Unfortunately it will take people dying before people realise what the incompetents at Downing Street have put them into.
The UK already gets wrecked when there is a bad winter storm. Couple that with a long power failure and it will be terrible. The only silver lining will be that it will almost certainly force a complete rethink and removal of the then current govt.
30
This maybe an ‘outrageous’ tbreat by France
ie to cut power to the UK, but so is the British threat to cut off French access existing to existing rights, outrageous if you are French . .
If you are to be objective, you cannot be ‘one eyed’
It is tit for tat.
GeoffW
46
Geoffrey
No. The local French fishermen have repeatedly been told that can carry on fishing as they have been doing for centuries, but according to the EU’s own laws have to provide proof they are regularly fishing those seas and are entitled to a licence. The french have been very slack at producing the documentation that they have been legally obliged to keep for decades.
So it is not tit for tat but part of Macrons/EU efforts to disable the UK for daring to point out that the EU has got far too big for its boots
201
The only times the French have co-operated completely with the English, and vice versa, were during the two World Wars of the twentieth century. Both occasions intimately involved the Germans.
You could say, with some justification, the earlier Napoleonic wars were more typical …
20
They cooperated pretty well with the Germans during the second world war.
50
With a knee on their neck.
Check out the little known actions after D-Day when it was largely the French forces that cleared the south from the Germa army.
30
Is it any wonder why nations that have swallowed the emission reduction poison pill are on the decline? We in Australia by now should be well advanced in the building stage for several new coal fired power stations, just like Japan is. Instead we are still debating as to what to do with Liddell. Stupid is a stupid does.
290
The politicians have chosen gas over coal at Liddell.
01
Not strictly correct. They have chosen to allow Liddell to be demolished. Diversified engineering firm Delta Group has been awarded the contract for the first stage of closure, decommissioning and demolition. The Federal government has said it may build a gas generator in Kurri to provide reliable power once Liddell ceases output.
51
Shouldn’t they be building the replacement before Liddel is closed down? That way there would be no disruption of supply,
80
Of course they should but politicians and big business today are clueless to the self destructive emissions reduction path they have adopted.
70
When our politicians were young they were impressed with Dumb and Dumber.
40
“MAY build a gas generator?”
Surely if they had any intention of doing so they would be spending a cou8ple of years coming up with plans and budgets. You don’t suddenly say “Oh! I’ve got a great idea lets build a power station tomorrow!”
30
How about keep Liddell running at all costs until a replacement coal or gas powered station is built? Sorry, too sensible and logical so it’s not going to happen. The populace need to learn the hard way if they are to learn at all. WAKE UP AUSTRALIA!
110
Morrison took out a big stick and told the energy providers that the taxpayers would build a replacement if the private sector failed to cough up.
‘Energy Australia has confirmed it will proceed with a new 300MW peaking power plant in the Illawarra in New South Wales capable of using a blend of green hydrogen and natural gas, as officials faced questions about a controversial Snowy Hydro project in the Hunter Valley.
‘Confirmation that the Energy Australia project will proceed follows a threat from the Morrison government to intervene in the market to ensure there are not shortfalls once the ageing coal-fired power plant at Liddell in the Hunter Valley closes in 2023.’ (Guardian)
03
So a nominal 2,000MW continuous plant will be “replaced” by a 300MW “peaking” plant? See my comments above.
60
el gordo why are you being an appeaser to the nation destroyers? Thank you Richard Owen No.3 for highlighting the point.
30
There is little value in waving our hands about, governments have decided that CO2 might cause global warming. We have to face reality, nothing short of a cultural revolution will change our present trajectory.
And I agree Richard’s comment definitely improves our knowledge.
03
This was more predictable than the climate in 100 years.
120
I was one of the thumb ups.
We keep forgetting that this is supposed to happen.
In the old days, they were less rhetorically sophisticated.
“We had to burn this village in order to save it.”
Is now pronounced …
“Build back better.”
(Except when Joe Biden says it it’s “Bim Bat Butter.”)
Eggs must be broken.
60
In Australia we don’t need foreign nations to threaten our power supply. We just do it ourselves!! I listened to an AEMO spox yesterday on commercial radio and he was blathering on about batteries to replace the imminent closure of Yallourn PS in 2028. Yet, right in plain sight is the REAL solution to that closure- build another one just like present, running on brown coal, except more efficient with better technology.
200
Interstate flight is the preferred course of action when faced with the irreversible idiocy that has overtaken Victoria.
50
Are they bringing back that number plate slogan of old –
“Victoria – the State to be From”?
70
They used to have ‘ Victoria, on the move’
40
They did, also ‘Victoria, garden state’.
I now think ‘Victoria, the poxy state’.
20
Looks like the UK is going to have to fire up their moth balled fossil-fuel power plants again, or maybe build a few shiny new nuke plants. It was only a matter of time anyway.
30
If this is currently an issue:
“but European energy markets were worth up to £2.3 billion for the UK”.
I think that it isn’t a long term position because surely they’re selling wind and solar, and the laws of common sense say that there will soon be a day of reckoning when all countries have to dump the expensive irregulars.
But then, what politician plans ahead like that.
50
Added as a late note:
In this case both leaders are playing a popular vote-winning card for their domestic audiences. There is a lot of puffery theater going on. But underneath that are very real vulnerabilities that will matter when things unravel due to pandemics, wars or economic crashes.
Who knows, what if a third party submarine decided to target those cables? Could they get away with that in the Channel?
Greater military minds than I will know more about what’s possible with submarines in the Channel — remembering that it doesn’t need to be a big sub to damage a power cable, or perhaps, even a sub. How about fishing boats, anchors or divers?
90
I suspect that in our haste to build things quickly rather than smart and efficiently, many minor details seem to be missed. The offshore wind turbines are currently experiencing a wearing of their cables in the ocean by currents.
When you generate something that needs hundreds of parts…
It only takes one broken one to waste billions of dollars making it a useless pile of unrecyclable scrap.
140
Good point.
“making it a useless pile of unrecyclable scrap.”
Making it? You are imply something that is wrong.
It was built as a useless pile of unrecyclable scrap.
The only functionality it ever had was in enabling the collection of Renewables Virtue Taxes; RVTs.
80
Beware the power bully! Australia is currently experiencing the problems of too many eggs in one Chinese basket. Europe is flexing its muscles. In truth, they want Jersey back in their control but the residents say “non”!
70
In the 1970s various US submarines tapped Soviet telephone cables laid on the sea floor around 1980 to gather intelligence information; see the Wikipedia page on “Operation Ivy Bells”. Severing a cable is a lot easier than tapping it undetectably. More on this is in Sherry Sontag’s remarkable book on the submarine Cold War, “Blind Man’s Bluff”.
50
Jo
As we have seen with America this week, you don’t need a physical presence in order to disrupt power supplies, you can do it by hacking.
Personally, I think that’s how the nest war will be played out. We will have our utilities disrupted-electricity, heating, water etc. Our mobile system disrupted, thereby causing complete panic to the millions of snowflakes who totally rely on these tings and then add in disruption to banking.
A triple whammy which with our worrying dependence on the internet becomes an ever more likely scenario that will take a week to bring us to our knees.
60
Jo
We have some very important cables liking us to Europe and the US as this article shows
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2009/oct/23/mysterious-cable-uk-us
Various cables have been severed in the past by Fishing boats so easy to imagine an enemy could cause serious disruption should they be determined to do so.
50
You are probably right, Tony, where things operate at scale. This is another reason a lot of people are leaving the intensely
crowded urban areas. Rural areas , especially those like mine close to a big city, will be impacted when say, the power goes out and the waterworks fail. But everyone in my neighborhood has a small generator that starts with a pull, and a car or two that has a lot of survival type capabilities, and a hurricane kit…and we can boil water and poop in a hole in the yard. We’ve gone two weeks without power & pumped water when the lines went down and restoring the inner cities was the highest priority; it was little more than annoying.
Had the city not been quickly restored in two weeks it would have been likely unlivable.
Whether or not one is capable of much abstract thinking, if one does most of one’s travel by elevator it’s time to rethink things.
If you are dealing with small things at the end of the line, its often easier to establish mechanical fail-safes if the electronics fail.
One would think engineering such would be an engineering discipline worthy of being brought to life. I think a lot of things that have been designed to require interconnection could use a default mode if it fails. And the power grid, at some minimum backbone level, can’t be failable if we’re to remain civilized….in the early days each discrete plant could default to its local service area if interconnections failed as they often did.
We have forgotten a lot of things we should remember, one of them being that human nature doesn’t seem to change much.
90
As with the vaccination-gate this fishing-gate is yet another example of where the EU bureaucracy has been failing miserably to keep order among its members. The prolem appears to be that many more French fishing boats want to fish in our waters than has ever been the case before. Of course who knows how many deals were struck with the French to encourage us to rely on their electricity generators rather than build our own.
Politicians just can’t be trusted whether you belong to The Club or not. And the EU has bred some of the most pathetic politicians the UK has ever seen. I was never a fan of Thatcher or her methods but at least we knew where we stood.
90
Glad the Navel boat was good for laughs. Fixed now, for better or worse — thanks. Patsy too. Ta. 🙂
60
At least the UK has somewhere to draw on for power. Here with the brain dead NSW plan, where they have not even got their maths right, assuming that a 12000 MW solar supply is equivalent to 12000 MW from a coal station – a train wreck approaches. And with Victoria having the same engineering/maths issue there is only 500MW that can come from QLD to assist. And lets not consider line losses…
I am actually thinking of putting together a business where I rent out diesel generators to assist businesses with the upcoming power supply failures…
What gets me is that the maths is hopelessly wrong. No engineer has obviously been involved, in fact nobody with any brain at all has been near any of this.
The only positive is that when it all falls over and the cities go black maybe some people will start to ask the hard questions of the complete incompetents we have as our leaders when it comes to Energy policy.
20
I get a laugh when they quote so many nameplate MWe of solar or wind, sounds impressive if you don’t know anything about power generation.
10
Yes Ronin, if they were not actually serious it would be funny. Capacity factor means nothing to these dunces.
The really frightening thing is the 2000MW batteries they talk about. People associate this as being the same as Liddell, whereas its only a tiny fraction (due to it being MWhr), and must be charged….In reality these monsters cost massively and any back of the envelope calculation v quickly shows that they are utterly uneconomic, unless power prices are astronomical….
00
Solar, Wind and batteries are (currently) NOT renewable energy. After all, what are wind turbines, solar panels and storage batteries made out of…thin air? At the moment, the only energy sources which might be defined as “renewable” are wood and hydro. Until politicians accept this, BOLO for plenty of blackouts.
10