Tag: energy

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All three of the first major hydropower projects in ‘Great Britain’ in 40 years due to be built in northern Scotland to double storage for Southern England

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From the Guardian today: Great Britain’s first new major hydropower projects in more than 40 years are expected to move ahead after the energy regulator gave a provisional green light to three proposals as part of a plan to reduce the country’s reliance on energy imports. All three of the new pumped storage hydroelectric power station projects are due to be built in northern Scotland, where the region’s lochs will act as natural reservoirs to serve the hydropower stations. The Loch Kemp project, developed by Statera Energy, plans to draw water from Loch Ness, and SSE’s Coire Glas project expects to draw from Loch Lochy … Continue reading All three of the first major hydropower projects in ‘Great Britain’ in 40 years due to be built in northern Scotland to double storage for Southern England

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Near-Shore Underwater Data Centres with Waste Heat Recovery – A Distinctly Scottish Opportunity – short and long read

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By Jim Mennie: Short version Scotland’s oil and gas industry still has a future, but that future is heavily constrained. Successive Westminster governments of all parties — Labour, Conservative and Liberal Democrat — have retained control over energy policy because it remains a reserved matter. As a result, Scotland has had little meaningful say over the pace of development, licensing decisions, or the long-term direction of the sector. This lack of control has left the industry and the communities that depend on it in a state of uncertainty for years.Rather than continuing to battle for greater influence within a system … Continue reading Near-Shore Underwater Data Centres with Waste Heat Recovery – A Distinctly Scottish Opportunity – short and long read

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UK Energy Minister, Michael Shanks, should be warned about Rural Scots trapped in a ‘quiet crisis’

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The Scotsman today has a report on the Poverty Alliance apparently warning the SNP on the costs of energy in rural parts, unconnected to the gas grid and where home heating oil has to be bought in bulk in the absence of any price protection. The absence of price protection for heating oil, the regulatory framework for energy markets, and the overall approach to supporting off-grid households are reserved matters.1 Scotland has a higher proportion of homes off the mains gas grid than most of the UK. These households (roughly 142,000 using oil) rely on heating oil (kerosene), LPG, or … Continue reading UK Energy Minister, Michael Shanks, should be warned about Rural Scots trapped in a ‘quiet crisis’

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TORY OIL AND GAS PROMISES IN ABERDEEN SOUTH: EMPTY RHETORIC FROM A PARTY OF WASTE

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By JimMennie As Aberdeen South goes to the polls today, Tories are still attempting to pitch themselves as the saviours of North Sea jobs. Their candidate and national figures claim they alone will “get Britain drilling” and reverse decline. The reality is starker. The long-term drop in oil and gas employment has been driven primarily by global markets, a maturing North Sea basin with smaller, costlier fields, and the inevitable energy transition — factors no Westminster government fully controls. Their own record of squandering billions in public money makes these promises ring hollow for voters who have lived through the … Continue reading TORY OIL AND GAS PROMISES IN ABERDEEN SOUTH: EMPTY RHETORIC FROM A PARTY OF WASTE

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Aberdeen By-election Special – Where tory Promises Go To Die

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By Jim Mennie The Tories like to present themselves as champions of North East Scotland. Yet issues like oil and gas show they definitively are not. But it’s not just oil and gas that exposes how they treat the voters of the North East as mugs. In 2014, the then Westminster Tory-LibDem coalition government promised to make North East Scotland a world leader in carbon capture technology. The then UK Energy Secretary, and now LibDem leader, Ed Davey confirmed Peterhead as the location for the world’s first gas-fired carbon capture and storage (CCS) facility – backed up by a £100 … Continue reading Aberdeen By-election Special – Where tory Promises Go To Die

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Reform UK cannot speak for workers in the North Sea

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By Jim Mennie Reform UK has positioned itself as a vocal advocate for the North Sea oil and gas industry, particularly in North East Scotland. The party presents its policies as a defence of high-skilled jobs, energy security and domestic energy production against what it describes as overly rapid net-zero targets and green levies. While the messaging resonates in oil-dependent communities, serious questions remain about the party’s experience, track record and ability to deliver on its promises. What Reform UK Proposes The party’s platform includes several core commitments: Fast-tracking new North Sea exploration licences as a priority. Maximising extraction of … Continue reading Reform UK cannot speak for workers in the North Sea

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Building standards and regulations in Scotland are generally more strict and demanding than those in England in several key areas

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In the Guardian on 11 February 2026: Even multimillionaires can’t escape Britain’s cowboy builders, it seems. Last week, residents of One Hyde Park, the UK’s most expensive flats, won a £35m court case against the contractor that built their homes. The high court ordered the construction company Laing O’Rourke to fix defective pipework that was discovered to be causing problems in 2014, only three years after the luxury development was completed. At the other end of the economy, tens of thousands of families are facing damp and mould issues also caused by botched building works. A National Audit Office investigation revealed in October … Continue reading Building standards and regulations in Scotland are generally more strict and demanding than those in England in several key areas

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‘The Trump administration’s reckless attack on radiation protection will have long-term consequences for public safety’ – Starmer and Sarwar plan to stupidly follow him

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From the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientist, yesterday: Worldwide, regulations limiting doses from the radiation emitted by nuclear fissions and decays are based on the Linear No-Threshold (LNT) model. This hypothesis posits that, irrespective of whether ionizing radiation comes in a pulse or over years, the additional risk of developing cancer as a result is proportional to the cumulative amount of energy deposited per gram of tissue, with weighting risk factors for radiation type, sex, age, and specific organs. Since 1975, the US nuclear industry has been required to limit exposures to workers and the public to “as low as reasonably achievable” … Continue reading ‘The Trump administration’s reckless attack on radiation protection will have long-term consequences for public safety’ – Starmer and Sarwar plan to stupidly follow him

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Producing more than half of the UK electricity from wind but Scots will just have to go ‘tribal’ to pay their bills

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with their bills is on the rise in Scotland according to Consumer Scotland. BBC Reporting Scotland in their regular wee BBC Breakfast inserts go on to suggest, via two brothers, a ‘tribal’ strategy, as they put it themselves, where they, their families and others live in the one house to keep energy bills down. So, it’s just up to us to cope with high energy bills is it? Are you sure we couldn’t do something else like political independence and the powers to tax the energy companies? Does Scotland produce enough energy to meaningfully generate enough tax revenue to then … Continue reading Producing more than half of the UK electricity from wind but Scots will just have to go ‘tribal’ to pay their bills

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‘This is disturbingly similar to what Donald Trump did earlier this year when he gutted the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the US Environmental Protection Agency.’

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Thanks to Jim Draper alerting me to this. From the Canary factchecker today: The nuclear industry will become “more dangerous” and regulation of the sector has been captured by “vested interests,” campaigners and experts have told the Canary, after the Nuclear Regulation Bill was put forward in the 2026 King’s Speech. From CND: When you think of nuclear accidents like at Windscale in 1957, Chernobyl in 1986, or Fukushima in 2011, it’s easy to see that Britain’s current nuclear regulatory procedures and rules are in place for a simple reason – that nuclear power is inherently dangerous. Rather than acknowledge these risks or legacy issues – like tackling the … Continue reading ‘This is disturbingly similar to what Donald Trump did earlier this year when he gutted the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the US Environmental Protection Agency.’