We must take energy threat seriously

The recent news that soon, large energy consumers may be encouraged to limit their power usage at certain times, and that power cuts are likely, has not received the media coverage it should.

The proposal shows the limitations of the adopted energy policy and the present government’s obsession with wind farms, where it is impossible to guarantee that power will be available at specified times.

Despite the much heralded increase in renewables during 2012 the real output that year is worth examining more closely. During two quarters of 2012 renewable power output actually dropped and despite the further claims of the Scottish Government that Scottish renewable generation is now “enough to power the equivalent of every home in Scotland”, the reality is that examination of this claim shows it to be an averaging and that the actual requirements of Scottish households were not met in this way and could not be for a minimum of six months in 2012.

That is despite the further claim by the Scottish Government that “wind generation was at a record high in 2012”.

Even with all the cost and damage so far, wind power remains less than half of Scottish actual renewable generation and the actual gross consumption of power in Scotland is two and a half times that which renewables can produce at best.

Keith and Elisabeth Urquhart

Carrbridge

Inverness-shire

There are amœba on Mars with a better knowledge of physics than our politicians which is why the energy regulator Ofgem is predicting a return to the 1970s blackouts.

Their obsession with green issues and the kind of Heath-Robinson renewable technology which requires exorbitant subsidies has made “fuel poverty” the new British disease.

We used to be an energy exporter but now we import a third of our consumption and in the still of the coldest winter night we are frighteningly reliant on French nuclear plants. Our similarity to Zimbabwe, the old African breadbasket whose people now starve, is increased by an ideological opposition to the shale which revolutionised US energy. The only question is whether the leaders of a nation which was once the most innovative and pragmatic on earth can get finally a grip on reality before the lights go out.

(Dr) John Cameron

Howard Place

St Andrews