Since before their conference in October the Conservative party have been raising fears of energy blackouts in Britain.

Greg Clark, Shadow energy minister, even claimed in his party conference speech that ‘there must be immediate action to keep the lights on‘ – a speech which, for dramatic effect, began in a darkened room.

The same language was trotted out at a debate about gas security in Westminster we helped organise, when Charles Hendry, Conservative Shadow Minister for Energy, raised the spectre of energy blackouts.

What’s going on here? Well, the thinly veiled subtext behind the Tory line goes like this: Britain is at the mercy of foreign powers – in particular the Russians – who supply us with our gas. It’s a pretty strong challenge. But is it right?

At the event, the experts who actually run our energy systems were pretty dismissive of the ‘energy blackout’ rhetoric. Chris Train, Network Operations Director at the National Grid, said that gas had not been in short supply during the cold spell, despite seven of the twenty coldest days on record in the UK.

Where gas had cut out, it was a result of the ‘Grid balancing supply and demand – reducing supply to some industrial customers on cheaper tariffs, who get lower bills in return for less predictability.

Sussex University energy expert Dr Jim Watson outlined new research showing that most challenges to energy security come from ropy domestic infrastructure (I’m paraphrasing) or limited gas storage capacity, but not from uncertainties in foreign supplies.

…more at Greenpeace UK

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