Northern Echo.
Dear Editor,
Closing down the UK’s coal-fired power stations within a decade will
doubtless cheer the environmentally-correct brigade but that doesn’t mean it is
the right thing to do.
I understand the desire for new gas-fired and nuclear replacements but
until they are functioning we should not be arranging to close down these
existing power stations, which provide approximately a quarter of all the UK’s
electricity.
It’s all very well the National Grid claiming that we don’t need to worry
about the lights going out but I do worry about it. And I also worry about the
tens of thousands living in fuel poverty, particularly
pensioners.
We are all aware that winter has definitely arrived now and for many
elderly folk that is literally a chilling thought, having to choose between
eating or heating. And a major reason is the high cost of energy because of
green levies on our energy bills resulting from the impossible carbon emission
targets demanded by the EU.
This country’s energy needs have been badly neglected for decades and a
coherent, comprehensive and long term solution is needed. One that will assure
supplies and cheap prices, not one cobbled together aimed at appeasing the EU
and climate summit meetings.
Energy minister Amber Rudd is proposing the coal-fired station closures
under the banner of energy security but it doesn’t seem very secure to me if she
means ever more dependence on politically unstable sources like
Russia.
Meanwhile Germany is currently building or refurbishing a couple of dozen
coal-fired plants. Why is the UK planning to close ours when other EU countries
are building them and Poland is refusing to give up its coal
capacity?
Yours faithfully
Jonathan Arnott MEP
