Less cost than the alternatives. It doesn’t really matter whether it’s in your village or a 100 miles away. They had a plan to build mini reactors in various locations. Not sure how that’s going. But throwing nuclear out of the window is pointless when much of the world is being powered by this technology.
Quite expensive according to wiki Annie…
How much does it cost to build a nuclear power plant in the UK?
25-26 billion pounds
The project in southwest England, Britain’s first new nuclear plant in more than two decades, was at the last update expected to start operations in June 2027, with an estimated cost of 25-26 billion pounds, which also was a revision of a previous 2025 start date at a cost then estimated at 18 billion pounds.25 Jan 2024
How much does it cost to build a gas power station?
Value for money
Recently, some commentators have asserted that gas will be much cheaper than nuclear. Figures have been quoted that gas-fired power stations cost £0.5m/MW to build, whilst nuclear could be as much as £6.9m/MW.
You make many good points.
The problem with eco-warriors is the inconsistency in it all.
Think on this one:
If they stopped us eating meat, and given we aren’t self sufficient, this would mean importing even more produce from thousands of miles away.
So what’s more ecologically sound, a locally reared grass fed cow, delivered 20 miles as meat, or quinoa, rice, spices, soy, coconut etc etc traveling thousands of miles?
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If the AMOC fails then northern Europe will be 20 to 40°C cooler than it is currently over about 100years.
It is not a failure of the Gulf Stream which is caused by the the rotation of the planet BUT it will force the Gulf Stream further north up the east coast of Canada causing rapid cooling of northern Europe. It has happened before.
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But you said
But there is always a cost, both to the environment and the worlds resources…
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We’ve discussed this before:
Britain has not been able to feed its population for over a century. It’s pie in the sky to think it can. Far better to find what it is really good at and trade that for food.
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Nobody is saying that we could become totally self sufficient Bruce, but we could do helluva lot better than we do now. And it would provide more jobs…More jobs = more tax and a better economy. Paying Australia to send us all our beef doesn’t really help the economy or the environment.
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I thought we had very low unemployment here OGF. More jobs would require more labour from outside. The government plan to automate instead. Where’s the tax benefit there?
Off shore wind farms?what a joke. has anyone given any thought about another war?
The first targets would be off shore wind farms, that would knock out most of our power supply in one hit.
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A small percentage does not mean a small impact. In 1959 the ppm of CO2 in the atmosphere was 320 ppm. By 2020 it was 420 ppm. So you are right that it is 0.04%. But it is also 25% higher. Its like saying “hey officer, its only 0.09 grams of alcohol in my blood stream, that’s tiny, right?” Small numbers do not mean its all good and fine. And to make things worse, forests and jungles that are the primary convertors of CO2 to 02 are being stripped at an alarming rate.
And, yes, atmosphere temperatures have been higher millions of years ago. That is not the point. The point is two fold. Its about the impact of higher temperatures and the change in getting there. Increasing temperatures cause instability: weather patterns change and become more extreme, much plant and animal life will need to evolve to adapt to the new climate, sea levels rise, large parts of the world become much less fertile, the productive arable parts of the world shrink and concentrated in different places. Dismissing the impact of such climate change by saying “hey, what’s the worry, the earth has been even hotter in past” entirely misses the point. that time when it was hotter was not suitable for the plants and animals around today.
But more significantly it will, it already is, add to the movement of people. That is inevitable.
Soz but your optimism on CO2 levels and climate change is misplaced.
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Have you wondered if stopping meat production would actually increase the country’s ability to feed itself? Meat production is massively inefficient compared to just growing crops for food. It takes 7 kilo of cereal to grow 1 kilo of beef. I know, I know, for some of the year a good bit of the food intake of cattle is grass, not cereal (not all cattle, and they’re not just eating grass, and only some of the year). But the cattle are on fields that could have produced vegetables for humans. So, in simple terms, removing all the cows from the UK would greatly enhance our ability to be self-sufficient in food. Not the other way round.
I’m not telling you to stop eating meat. I am not going to stop eating meat. I am just letting you know that your claim that imports of food would go up is very evidently wrong.
PS cattle are one of the larger contributors of green house gases, see my post above.
Sure. Who likes milk and cheese anyway…let’s just strip the forest of another part of the world and grow more soy.
Thanks for that observation.
My post was about the factuality of the claim that stopping eating meat would have the consequence of more food imports. There is no evidence for that. Rather, on paper at least, it would seem likely that the need for food imports (and remember, cattle feed is imported too) would go down.
My post was not any sort of endorsement of removing all livestock from the UK or anywhere else. I did not state that eating meat or dairy products should stop.
But in answer to your question - me, I like cheese. Both cow and goat cheese. And I do not like soya milk. What I also dislike is people writing poorly informed opinion and presenting it as confirmed fact.
You said removing all the cows would greatly enhance our ability to be self-sufficient in food. But that would only mean some self-sufficiency for vegans. In terms of the climate it’s just moving one part of the problem to another geographical area.
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When forests are cut down, much of that stored carbon is released into the atmosphere again as carbon dioxide (CO2)**. This is how deforestation and forest degradation contribute to global warming, so, the loss of our woodlands alongside the magnitude of fossil fuel vehicles in use throughout world are still the driving force for climate change, and while your examples of plastic being a legit point and concern, as mighty glaciers melt in the Arctic, new research finds million-year-old methane gas trapped beneath the ice is surfacing, with a potential to further warm the planet. To me, the arguing over being a Vegan, a meat eater, religion, and politics, are all man made pettiness, and down right selfishness. We best be coming together to work out the problems of the world, like it or not, we are all a people, same race / species, and this is our home, are we going to be the beginning of the end of the human species, and what are we leaving future generations, a legacy of greed and selfishness ? Shucks, it appears with the largest brains we are the dumbest species on earth.
I meant proper jobs Annie, like producing food through farming instead of sending all of our young people to university and giving them expensive qualifications that they will never benefit from. We need more people in media studies, art and drama, and bean counters. No wonder we have to import skilled workers from elsewhere. In 1989 when I ran the London Marathon you had to enter your occupation…The largest number of runners were engineers.
This year it was…
Virgin, the marathon sponsors, provide a breakdown of all this year’s 49,795 runners by occupation. As you can see from the table below, teachers are the best represented profession, with a strong showing from accountants and students. There are also stockbrokers, game keepers and vicars.
It’s manufacturing, farming and the food/fishing industry that makes a successful economy, not buying stuff in from the other side of the world and teaching our young folk that sitting behind a desk in none productive roles. How many accountants do we need?
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1 point I would like to make, never undermind the value of education, and in today’s world advanced technology is effecting every field, and yes, including farming, but the problem with farming it is always dependent on so many factors, many of which we have absolutely no control, so it has lost it’s lustre to younger generations.
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great informative post, thank you.
How do those three industry sectors make for a successful economy?
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