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97% of Scotland’s aviation fuel demand was met by Grangemouth so closing it was deliberately harmful

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By Capella From Google AI: Before ending crude oil processing in April 2025, the Grangemouth Refinery supplied about 65% of all petrol, diesel, and jet fuel used in Scotland. For aviation fuel specifically, it accounted for up to 97% of Scotland’s supply, fueling major airports like Edinburgh and Glasgow. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5] Note – the source numbers will cleverly, for TuS, take you right out of here, so maybe click on them after you’ve read the whole thing? Because of the war in the Middle east, in which Westminster participates through Akrotiri in Cyprus (home of bambi bucket bearing Chinooks which we can’t have), the price … Continue reading 97% of Scotland’s aviation fuel demand was met by Grangemouth so closing it was deliberately harmful

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The Hammer Of The Scots – Can Scotland afford to remain part of the Union?

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By Mark E. Saunders of “The Scottish Minuteman” https://www.facebook.com/profile.php/?id=61575625542197 Every August, a report drops like a hammer — GERS. The Government Expenditure and Revenue Scotland report arrives with the same ritual timing, and the same ritual headlines. Scotland, we are told, is broke. Scotland, we are told, is subsidised. Scotland, we are told, cannot stand on its own two metaphorical feet. I must admit, it is an interesting annual event. But I really don’t want to talk about the methodology of GERS, or the fact that 25 of its 26 figures are more guesswork than estimates. Those arguments have been made many times before … Continue reading The Hammer Of The Scots – Can Scotland afford to remain part of the Union?

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Update – After two years UK Labour Government accused of betraying children as attainment gap there widens while narrowing in SNP Scotland

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Update at 16:40pm – Edited in the light of thoughts on the deliberately different targets adopted in Scotland and in rUK.vvv From tes 4 August 2026: The attainment gap between the most and least disadvantaged students – a key measure of success set by the Scottish government – narrowed slightly for each of the three qualifications: from 16.4 percentage points to 15.6 at National 5; from 16.8 percentage points to 15.9 at Higher; and from 13.3 percentage points to 12.1 at Advanced Higher. https://www.tes.com/magazine/news/secondary/qualifications-scotland-exam-results-2026-pass-improve Meanwhile in England, from FE week, avoiding the almost certainly catastrophic ‘class-based’ comparisons carefully, and based on the … Continue reading Update – After two years UK Labour Government accused of betraying children as attainment gap there widens while narrowing in SNP Scotland

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Is this a Scottish Labour thing? Building hospitals next to and downwind of raw sewage? Case 2 – Clydebank

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Thanks to derekscott1953 for alerting us to this: As Joe Murray pointed out on an earlier version of this topic, the NHS Golden Jubilee University National Hospital in Clydebank was built in 1994 as a private facility by US firm, Health Care International, for £180 million. Located on the north bank of the River Clyde in the Dalmuir area, it sits along the waterfront near local industrial and utility infrastructure, including the regional wastewater treatment works for West Dunbartonshire and North West Glasgow. At the time, the Labour leaders either as thick as the stuff in the ‘waste stabilisation ponds’ … Continue reading Is this a Scottish Labour thing? Building hospitals next to and downwind of raw sewage? Case 2 – Clydebank

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Most of the heavier crude oil from Rosebank will be sent to the Netherlands because only Grangemouth could refine it

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By Liz S “The new and upgraded high-voltage transmission infrastructure in Scotland (new pylons, higher-capacity overhead lines, substations, and related works) is primarily required to transmit surplus electricity across the border into England and the wider Great Britain system” Yes indeed, but it’s not just electricity as the BBC website has this article, dated 11 August 2026, on their website on the Scottish Politics page: “What is happening with the Rosebank and Jackdaw oil and gas fields”? Included within this BBC article are the below statements of how, once again , the UK/Britain are again reliant on assets/resources sourced from Scotland , that are … Continue reading Most of the heavier crude oil from Rosebank will be sent to the Netherlands because only Grangemouth could refine it

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Public Health Professor’s message for Scottish Labour’s nuclear plans – ‘I personally would not live near a nuclear power plant’

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Chatgpt image (copyright-free) based on photographs of the nuclear waste storage in Plymouth USA From the Plymouth Independent, two days ago: The 1972 opening of the Pilgrim nuclear power plant might have been the worst thing to happen in Plymouth’s long history. It ushered in an era of fool’s gold prosperity that, over time, exacted a steep price on what was a quintessential sleepy town. Today, Pilgrim’s lingering side effects – including more than five dozen casks filled with radioactive waste at the ocean’s edge – offer a cautionary lesson for those who believe building a new, albeit smaller, reactor is an idea worth … Continue reading Public Health Professor’s message for Scottish Labour’s nuclear plans – ‘I personally would not live near a nuclear power plant’

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Three more French nuclear power stations shut down as jellyfish swarm cooling pipes will any Scottish reporter ask Scottish Labour how they plan to deal with this?

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Thanks, once more, to Frances McKie for alerting us to this and who comments: It keeps coming back to basic things like plumbing, blockages and corrosion…..at Dounreay, they never found a way to stop seaweed blocking their intake pipes…Here it’s jellyfish. From Reuters yesterday: Three reactors at ‌France’s Gravelines nuclear power plant were shut down late on Monday due to a massive swarm of jellyfish, triggering preventative measures put in place last year after the entire plant went offline, operator EDF said. The plant in northern France is one of the ​largest in the country and is cooled from a canal … Continue reading Three more French nuclear power stations shut down as jellyfish swarm cooling pipes will any Scottish reporter ask Scottish Labour how they plan to deal with this?

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The real Glasgow hospital scandal is Labour in 2008 deciding to put it next to tonnes of raw sewage unlike any other hospital in the world

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Details: https://talkingupscotlandtwo.com/2026/08/12/the-real-glasgow-hospital-scandal-in-the-whole-world-only-one-government-has-ever-deliberately-built-a-new-hospital-next-to-a-raw-sewage-works/ Continue reading The real Glasgow hospital scandal is Labour in 2008 deciding to put it next to tonnes of raw sewage unlike any other hospital in the world

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Sludge leaks, spills, and fails to be contained so build your super-hospital further away

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Once more, deep thanks to our friend who shared this ‘sludge’ with us. From: Olden, R. (2016) Sludge. Cultural Geographies, 23(4), pp. 715719. (doi:10.1177/1474474016630966) We are standing over the inlet of Shieldhall Wastewater Treatment Works where the rush of stuff banished to an underworld of sewers and culverts spews from a protruding pipe to meet the light of day once again: the sewage and wastewater of half a million people….Here at Shieldhall, Scotland’s largest wastewater treatment works, the task is to separate water from waste. Wastewater runs a course which sees it filtered, settled, dredged and then metabolised by nitrifying … Continue reading Sludge leaks, spills, and fails to be contained so build your super-hospital further away

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The real Glasgow hospital scandal – In the WHOLE world only one government has ever deliberately built a new hospital next to a raw sewage works

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In previous reports on the inquiry hearing expert witnesses, we’ve revealed that of 7 recent new large city hospitals across the UK, including in Manchester, only Glasgow City Council, in 2008, opted to build right next to a large raw sewage plant. In the years that followed after the SNP took power in 2017, Anas Sarwar groomed the traumatised parents of cancer victims, where autopsies had revealed the presence of a fungus found in pigeon droppings, and blamed the SNP for a failure to build-in proper protections in the hospital systems. We, at Taking-up Scotland, did not know until recently, … Continue reading The real Glasgow hospital scandal – In the WHOLE world only one government has ever deliberately built a new hospital next to a raw sewage works