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My biggest fear with increasing use of nuclear to the point where it's commmercially viable is that it will get sold off to overseas interests [like as very nearly already happened recently]. Whilst they may even have more expertise; they will acquire the rights to bury their waste with ours away from their shores ...Don't do it!

It was John Garner - Vice President from 1933 to 1941 - who coined the phrase when advising Johnson not to accept Kennedy's offer in 1960.

Nuclear power is the greenest energy, and France is practically all nuclear. Cutting down on coal powered stations is a good thing as carbon emmissions are lowered.

However, the only negative points about nuclear power are:

- where does the nuclear waste go?
- what effect will burying nuclear waste have on the environment/wildlife/people?
- where do the new nuclear stations get built?
- how will we be assured that there won't be another Chernobyl?

70 billion public charity on cleaning up nuclear buys a lot of renewables. The campaign should be for a two way grid as in germany. it employs 1/4 m people and generates 23 billion euros. The uk is one of the few countries not to benefit from a two way grid. For whom are the advantages of a one way grid?

Housing is not a luxury or a commodity. Without acces a house in the uk climate you will likely reduce the survival rate. Yet the Govt think it can be 'left to the markets' designed to make profit not access to housing for all. How often do the Govt have to be proved wrong for the penny [several billion of them] to drop?

It must now be obvious to most people that the eco-fascist agenda is simply to put the lights out in Britain. We have our own good quality coal supply so why not make use of it. Perhaps the eco-fascists are working with the stock market parasites so they can continue to change money on imports.

We could all be looking at the latest green scam here, burning coal produces far less water vapor than gas. As water vapor is said to be just as bad for climate change as carbon dioxide perhaps the alleged high CO2 is compensated for by a lack of water vapor ?

Could your prioritise Paul Mason on China and the VP story from the US? Scotland's
not having anything to do with nuclear -
I suggest you discuss it after we optout.

ANOTHER QUOTE OF THE DAY

Jim Knight proudly validated the beleaguered SATs by trumpeting that they are good predictors of GCSE results. Um . . .
Isn't the idea to use the SATs, in part at least, to spot those not doing do well, and lift their performance accordingly? This would, of course, break the predictive correlation. Is it me? Or is it Jim?

You know, in fifty years' time and, certainly, one hundred years' time, people will look back on now and be astonished at the mass hysteria that swept the world regarding 'combating climate change' – the three Cs. This time will go down, in history, as one of the strangest in the evolution of mankind.

I’m thinking of starting a 'war' diary so as I can explain to my grand-children how I managed to survive the 'time of lunacy', when eco-nutters, aided and abetted by the increasingly amateurish left-wing media, convinced themselves they had brainwashed the public to believe the planet was doomed - dooomed - unless we dropped everything to control the emission of a colourless and odourless gas called Carbon Dioxide. I could explain that all around me, intelligent people dropped like flies, to worship at the altar of 'climate change' - normally perfectly rational people, but who spontaneously lost half their I.Q. when the issue of CO2 arose in conversation. I would draw eerie parallels to the belief, by many educated people, of the existence of God.

By the way, did anyone notice on the news programme on the fourth channel, how that idiotic Green MEP didn’t mention windmills, solar panels or wave power, when calling for alternatives to coal power, but insisted on combined heat and power and energy efficiency? Is it too much to hope she’s woken up to the absurdity of most 'renewables': the power not being available when you want it; and, in most cases, it being impossible to store the generated electricity for future use?

These are a few questions for the editor of Newsnight and I would appreciate answers if that's possible: Is it correct that Brian Wilson now has a direct connection with the nuclear industry? If so, why is he still being captioned just as "Former Energy Minister". If he is not connected with the nuclear industry could you nevertheless caption him with his current interests rather than his past career. I used to be a Mod, and much as I would like people to view me as such, unfortunately that stage of my life has past - in much the same way that Brian Wilson's previous incarnation as energy minister is no longer.

Brian Wilson is a Director of AMEC Nuclear.

Brian's AMEC Nuclear Holdings describes itself as 'the UK's largest private nuclear services business'.

I would run a Geiger counter over the Newsnight studio before leaving - and
suspect that George Monbiot's half-life
as a serious pundit has just shortened.

Glasgow's GOMA (Gallery of Modern Art) has just purchased Alison Watt's "Phantom" for
£45,000. That is Scottish contemporary art.

@ Strugglingtostaycalm

It's tiresome to read another 'belief in climate change is like a belief in god' caricature.

As every non-scientific argument against climate change tries to occlude (often for it's own political ends), it is science and a growing body of evidence that posits a link between CO2 emissions and climate change. The fact the gas is odourless and colourless offers no comfort.

'Eco-nutters' and the 'left wing media' are not in a sufficient position of power to hoodwink the public. Powerful interests to the contrary certainly are, but nonetheless the scientific method does at least offer something close to truth, so we're having to face up to that truth.

You only have to look at how hysterical and offensive conspiracy theorist's arguments get, which increasingly look like the work of cranks when all the major parties on the right and left recognise the threat of climate change.

@ the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ

The idea there is a 'split' in the green movement is a non-story. As it has been said, the scientist James Lovelock has been banging on about this for years - his opinion is that CO2 is far more lethal than compact bunkers of nuclear waste.

Perhaps you should have focused on how energy policy has had a shocking lack of leadership, which has allowed this coal-fire plant to get through without proving carbon-capture technology. That's certainly much more like religious faith.

What was also rather dodgy was Gavin Esler turning to Brian Wilson as the only
"ex-politician" present and asking if the terms of the political debate had changed on this ....... Wilson is the lobbyist who's
been trying his best for the last 10 years
to make nuclear power acceptable again!

I'm just amazed that Newsnight gives so much publicity to the Climate Campers, who do not appear to have a lot of the burdens that most of us have with home and family responsibilities.

Maybe your should ask everyday people with families and children to support what they think about current energy policy, after all they form a greater majority than the Climate Campers.

As for Jonathon Porritt and the other 'environmentalist gurus', they remind me of that episode in Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy, where the advance party of useless people are sent on ahead to a distant planet, in the mistaken belief that the rest of us would soon follow.

Greenies Infighting Debate -

Not worth the dead skin flakes on the end of my fingers to comment on that , sorry !


Northern Rock -

No surprise !
How about asking how many self certificated mortgages they hold ?


China -

Well everything is speculation , we know at some point there will be change , but only then will we see if we have helped create a partner or a monster with our trade with them.


The Times Report -

Looks like it could develop into a major story in the coming months , morally speaking !

What might have been interesting would be to look at China's energy options - there's clearly a fair bit of smog (even with steel
plants shut in Beijing) but do they really
need to go down the nuclear route with
help from Westinghouse (which is I see
now owned by the Japanese?) In 2001,
the Italian economist the late Paolo Sylos Labini suggested an alternative pattern
of development might be possible in his
Federico Caffe Lectures when he wrote:

"For the future a nightmare is often evoked: if the underdeveloped countries entered into a sustained process of economic growth following a path similar to that of the now advanced countries - mass production of traditional cars, polluting factories and the rest - then a catastrophic outcome would be in sight for the whole of mankind. We hope that certain innovations - for instance, electric cars - can dispel that nightmare." But then he added this very interesting China comment: "Another very
important contribution can be made by that type of industrialisation that has asserted itself in certain parts of Europe, especially in Central Italy, led by industrial-rural districts and, on a much more extensive scale, in China. The relatively small units characterizing these districts can avoid large polluting factories, with advantages also for workers, since in these units the terrible suffering connected with mass production and alienation can be largely avoided. Thus, it is important for everyone to promote the spread of this type of industrialisation in underdeveloped countries" ['Underdevelopment: A Strategy for Reform' by Paolo Sylos-Labini (2001)].

So what happened? Have Paul Mason and Will Hutton and the other China experts a few insights on alternative development paths for China? Have the cheap textiles wiped out the garment industry in Italy which may have been one of the sectors that Sylos-Labini was then thinking about?
Sebastiano Brusco used to write about
'artisan-led growth' in Italy - any signs
of that in China? Any signs of reverse
migration back to rural areas as there
has been some reverse migration in
Europe back to rural Poland recently?

I keep remembering too that E.F. Schumacher who wrote "Small is
Beautiful" also used to work for
The National Coal Board before
he got into Bhuddist economics!

And somebody was telling me
recently that many of the best
academic papers in chemistry
these days seem to originate
in China? Are they perhaps
the guys to crack clean coal
technology - assuming they
are not led down the wrong
garden path by the western
nuclear engineering industry?

One wonders how much longer the one-eyed (ie. corrupt) ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ can continue to feature comment after comment, guest after guest 'on message' about this garbage about global warming without a single dissenter in sight or anyone to cross-examine this global fraud.

CO2 has never, in 720,000 years, influenced Earths temperature. It always follows temperature, reacting 400-1,400yrs after.

CO2 is a trace element in our atmosphere amounting to a paltry 0.0038%. If you want to claim you can change the worlds weather you better have some big numbers to back up your bluff. CO2 isn't a big number, it's a miniscule number with no known influence despite the UN's IPCC spending 10 years in a lame attempt to do so.

And the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ's survey tonight showed CO2 amongst the public has declined from 16% as a major issue concern to barely 5%. It is not only a minority science but a minority public issue.

So how many more programmes like tonights do we have to endure where vacuous greens with science fiction decide how to decide public policy on energy is best divided up. The minority loony parties have taken over the asylum and the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ represent that wierdo fringe group.

It's only a matter of time for what's happening to Labour in by-elections happens to the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ as a 'public' broadcaster and gets marginalised with the cringe fringe groups they represent. Let's have a proper debate with genuine arguments and less of this corrupt one-sided journalism that shows contempt for democracy, contempt for journalistic integrity and contempt for what public service should stand for.

I keep seeing these CO2 debates being stifled by the tax collecting scaremongerers who follow like sheep a few scientists who created a model to suit their agenda.
I see the latest model created to justify the current 10 years of global cooling now keeps the tax collectors happy till 2020. If you are wrong will the taxes be refunded, or will it be a case of sorry we've spent it on millenium dome type novelties?
This modeling to fit the curve I studied at school is called Fourier Analysis.

The cruicial analysis only needs to be; does the CO2 rise, lag or lead global temperature. Only a mathematician it would seem can tell you that the ony way to read the graphs is to look at the turning points and not by looking at mid rise or mid fall if the two graphs follow each other generally. Search out the most accurate graphs and see for yourself.
Funny how the worlds most powerful computers as used by the MET cant even predict tomorrows weather.. look at the tornados in the US yesterday, yet they can measure an average of1/4 deg over 100 years and call it a change! Of course if there had been no change at all then I'd call it a computer simulation.
Always listen to the few [except those with an agenda like Gore, who gets a Nobel Peace Prize for an animated simulation that allows his companies to sell more green stuff to the sheep] How many Newtons, Einsteins, Darwins were there?
Finally exactly what do we think will happen tto the world if it does get warmer? Take a peek at the ancient civilisations uncovered under current deserts; was the land moist because there was less global warming and the polar regions held back more fresh water? I don't think so!

George, George, why did you sell out? Credibility gone, man. You are now with the green-haters...'see, even Monbiot has seen sense' and all the Wilson types with their fingers in the nuclear pie will gain even more credence. At least Porritt gave them a fight and his credentials have been seriously questioned lately. If we ever have a Chernobyl or a 'waste' problem I hope these sell-out merchants can look their grandchildren in the face, if they are still around.

Thanks to some interesting PR surrounding a protest at a power facility, an aspect of this topic has again come to the fore for a brief flurry before we worry about JP’s undies again.

So I turn to Newsnight in hope of some objectivity to help me learn the issues, to help me shape an opinion should I ever be asked to vote sensibly on the directions we take (assuming voting is still in fashion in the near future – I do notice that these days the majority not voting the ‘right’ way can get frowned upon, and to quite extensive coverage in some places, by minority commentators who seem to think, and are often accepted by the bookers who give them airtime, as ‘knowing better’).

And what, or rather who do I find? An ‘environmental activist’ of questionable qualifications (‘Leading’? By what measure and whose agreement?), who seems to have carved a career by writing provocative articles in a very minor broadsheet, who says ‘Oh heck, anything but coal.. let’s go nuke, then’. Words, if loose, that are deemed (again, er.. why and by whom) to have sent ripples throughout, well, parts of North London at least.

I’m not sure, but I have this notion that the issue is not that simple. And spans not just the choices we face on energy, but also economic vs. environmental balances, geo-political considerations, immigration, population and a host of other stuff I really don’t envy those staked with unraveling this Gordian knot (and not Gordon, for sure).

But a group have decided they don’t fancy an aspect, and so we get a ratings punt by a broadcast medium using a media-friendly person’s dubious pontifications as a basis. Does the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ not have anyone of relevance to add to this critical discussion at the level one would expect ? Or is the speed dial restricted to the half-dozen usual suspects who live in the mews next door when not in their country cottage? I have no problem with opinions from all walks, but surely they need to be balanced (and not a blooming classic ‘two/threefer wheeling out extremes from far sides... a nuke industry spokesperson for heaven’s sake, but billed – I need to find from fellow posters - as a ‘former energy minister’). And can we not get some objective science and engineering FACTS in the mix? Possibly a bit of rational economic pragmatism and/or political realism too?

So what’s going to get me, or my kids’ kids first? A C02 (man-caused/worsened or not still a little up in the air, ‘scuse pun) dawn, or a nuclear one (Space 1999 style)? I have no blooming clue, and nothing sensible to help try and figure it out.

We really do need more sense of objectivity, and ‘opinion former’s’ backgrounds do become pertinent... What stance they are taking? Where are they getting their money from? A book deal? A lobby group? Quango target bonus? An activist board salary/pension? The message can often end up being very coloured by the messengers, especially self-proclaimed ones deemed ‘expert’.

And, as with a few others in this Heat’ed debate, I am afraid the more I see Mr. Lovelock’s opinion in an article with ‘his new book is published.. at £16.95 by [coincidental news media publishing arm]’ at the end, the less I feel inclined to read on.

Especially if ‘his opinion is that CO2 is far more lethal ..’ comes not so long after I find he may be one of the first passengers atop a column of greenhouse gasses on the Virgin orbital gawping (rich) tourist shuttle.



Do I like the idea of coal (especially without any viable CCS) as proposed? No. But do I like the idea of nuclear much better, especially as many key aspects seem still unresolved... disposal, ROI, enviROI, etc). No, not yet.

But I see how delay can be viewed as frustrating. However the way the issues are portrayed certainly don’t help. ‘The environmental movement is split’ I heard the reporter say, well, challenge at one stage. What the heck IS ‘the environmental movement’. It seems a rather odd, artificial construct almost designed to create a ‘them’ vs. others quality that can help nobody, and especially the quality of discussion.

Stop giving sound bite airtime on a hobby horse basis. If it is as serious as has been suggested, treat it seriously and get a decent spread of sensible views who can at least explain where we currently are rationally. It has to be better than the sensationalist spinning that passes for news I see in this arena, and I’m frankly fed up with it.

FIELD DEPENDENCY AND 'YES..BUTS'.

Spanner7337 (#18) "It's only a matter of time for what's happening to Labour in by-elections happens to the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ as a 'public' broadcaster and gets marginalised with the cringe fringe groups they represent."

Yes. But sadly, as long as opinion poll/Focus Group consensus mentality continues to drive production this can only get progressively worse and worse as the population continues to be dumbed down reproductively/genetically.

I fear the PC editors/producers won't/don't/can't fully understand the modus operandi of this insidious process.

There will be lots of 'yes..buts....' (which fo far too long has passed as intelligent 'argument'). Sadly, field dependency really is predominantly a female thing and look at the sex-balance in journalism/media. It has consequences as does the fact that 80% of psychologists (for example) are now females. This is hardly indicative of 'equality' or 'balance', but then nobody seems to be at all bothered enough to think through the implications.....

what a muppet. The german feed in tariff for renewables produces more electricity than the whole uk nuclear fleet. if he wants to promote something promote a retail feed in tariff for the uk which seems to be the only european country without one. So who benefits from the status quo?