NEW ENERGY TO SAVE THE BRITS

U.K. Push for Renewable Energy to Prevent Electric Power Crisis
Alex Morales and Catherine Airlie, February 29, 2012 (Bloomberg News)

"Britain’s policies encouraging renewable-energy use will prevent the country from suffering an electricity crisis leading to blackouts toward the end of the decade, Bloomberg New Energy Finance said…The U.K. will build more than 30 gigawatts of power generation capacity by the end of 2016, two-thirds of it in solar, wind and biomass and the rest largely fired by natural gas…

"That will help the nation cope with closing 19 gigawatts of fossil- fuel and nuclear power stations over this decade…[and] avoid power shortages that blighted the U.K. during World War II and the 1970s, requiring industry to scale back operations and leaving millions of homes in the dark…U.K. utilities need to spend as much as 200 billion pounds ($320 billion) to replace aging power plants and upgrade the electricity grid by 2020…"

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"About a third of Britain’s fossil-fuel power stations are due to close in the next three years to meet European Union rules on emissions…RWE and Electricite de France SA are due to switch on new gas-fueled power stations this year, and in total 11 gigawatts of gas plants may be built through 2016…New Energy Finance…predicts 2 gigawatts of biomass plants, about 11 gigawatts of wind and 8 gigawatts of solar power will be installed in the five years through 2016…

"Britain’s oldest [nuclear] reactor…[closed recently]…Other atomic plants may shut in the next decade as they reach the end of their working lives…[A] civilian nuclear cooperation agreement with French President Nicolas Sarkozy…[paves] the way for the construction of a new generation of power stations in the U.K…EDF, in partnership with Centrica Plc (CNA), is among six utilities planning to build atomic stations in Britain...[The first] new plant [could be] up and running in 2018…"