Should the SNP win an overall majority tomorrow then we can expect to see the approval of many more windfarms in the mad rush to meet the wholly unrealistic renewable energy targets set out in the SNP. The cost to consumers has not been mentioned and for good reason. A recent government report suggests domestic bills will rise by around £500 a year resulting Continue reading »
A win for the SNP may cost you £500 a year
Energy, Environment, Politics
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May 042011
Apr 122011
Score: 3.5/5
Located in Cathedral St, the café offers a good variety of teas and coffee, made to order sandwiches, soup and tasty cakes. Service is quick and the food is of good quality. Décor is clean and minimalist and for those wishing to sit outside there is a small walled back yard. Does not accept credit cards!!
We tried the smoked salmon and smoked chicken sandwiches, both of which Continue reading »
The Scottish Lib Dems manifesto proposes to raise £1.5 billion by tinkering with Scottish Water. There is however an easier way to free up a similar amount of money – repair the existing Forth Road Bridge instead of building a new one.
This can be done at a cost of around £200M and involves replacing or strengthening the main cables. It would also mean at least 60 weeks of contraflows but spread over 3 years. The bridge would not be shut to traffic.
According to the FETA website (Forth Estuary Transport Authority) “The original design life of the Forth Road Bridge was 120 years but with proper maintenance will last longer than that.”
The original fear was that continued corrosion in the cables would lead to HGVs being banned from crossing by 2013. This has turned out to be somewhat pessimistic and the date has been pushed back to between 2017 and 2021. FETA also reports that the cable drying process appears to be working and some lengths of the west cable are drying out.
Traffic growth also appears to be less than expected. Figures provided by FETA for the last 2 years are incomplete but we do know that traffic across the Tay Bridge has only risen by 2% since tolls were abolished 3 years ago.
Whoever wins the forthcoming election, I cannot see construction of a new bridge being stopped. It is too much of a vanity project for some of our politicians.
Recommended links www.forthrightalliance.org www.feta.gov.uk
As from mid April, Fife Council will increase car park charges by around 18%. The typical 1 hour charge will increase from 85p to £1.00. I suppose 15p is not a huge sum but it is a much higher than inflation increase and in a small way actually increases inflation. This will do no favours to Fife’s high street retailers who continue to shrink in numbers as people head to retail parks and free parking.
Mar 182011
At last we have a proper renewable energy project underway in the tidal waters between Islay and Jura.
Yesterday’s announcement of a 10MW facility costing some £40 million will take two years to complete and will have a capacity to power approx 5,000 homes. Good news also for the local community who will benefit from an influx of cash and hopefully jobs.
Tidal Stream Energy is predictable, and will always be there unless the moon drops out of the sky. Placed on the seabed, these turbines cause minimal visual impact and can operate in both ebb and flood tides generating power for more than 10 hrs a day every day. This means they have a much higher efficiency than wind turbines. Tidal Stream Energy has the potential to provide around 6% of the UK electricity demand and 70% of this resource is located in the Pentland Firth area and the Channel Islands. Scotland is therefore well placed to exploit this resource.
However, we must be aware that electricity from renewable sources costs just over double that of conventional power stations. The Scottish government does not say much about this preferring instead to trumpet about Alex Salmond’s revised target to meet 80% of electricity demand from renewables by 2020.
Despite this, I believe we must speed up development of Tidal Stream technology as quickly as possible and do so at the expense of wind turbines which so far have failed to deliver.
