ENERGY USE IN BRITAIN
Fossil fuels are a finite resource, and can only become more scarce, expensive, and unreliable in the long term future. They are also making our world uninhabitable through the greenhouse gases they produce.
Despite this, world demand for such fuels is expected to double by 2050 largely due to the emerging economies of China and India. Surely this is a recipe for disaster.
On the positive side, Sweden aims to be oil free within 15 years, and Brazil is already using bio fuels for 80% of its needs.
Britain presently consumes 2% of fossil fuel production, and produces an equivalent amount of greenhouse gases. Even if we do nothing, this will reduce to about 1% eventually, but that is no reason not to take radical action before it is too late, when, through war or shortage, the electricity is turned off, or places like London and Torbay are underwater.
OIL AND GAS will become increasingly scarce, expensive, and unreliable.
NUCLEAR ENERGY is highly expensive and potentially dangerous, especially prone to terrorist attack, the consequences of which are unimaginable.
RENEWABLE ENERGY (Sun, wind, wave and tidal power) is very expensive, and can never totally fill the need. For instance, it is estimated that we would need at least 250,000 windmills to generate our electricity, but they are productive for only one third of the time.
I suggest that we must continue to use all means of obtaining energy, but from as wide a variety of sources as possible, not to put all our eggs in one basket. But above all, there should be a push to reduce our need for energy consumption drastically. The government believe this to be possible, and have an aspiration to cut our energy use by 60% by the year 2050.
They have plans to implement this in industry and commerce, via a policy of CARBON TRADING, but as yet, no politician has come up with a way of reducing private and individual consumption of energy, it being deemed too unacceptable to the voters. If nothing is done, energy, in the form of petrol, diesel, gas, and electricity will gradually just become evermore expensive, meaning that driving will become a rich mans preserve, and the poor may go cold, which is totally unacceptable in a modern society. On the other hand Germany has begun a programme whereby all buildings will be upgraded over the next 20 years to modern energy conservation standards.
At the present moment, the great British public are irresponsibly feckless and profligate in their use of energy though nowhere near as much as Americans (who use 3.5 times as much per head), and if the problem is to be tackled fairly and successfully, habits must be changed not just by the stick and compulsion, but by the use of the carrot as well; give people an incentive to save energy, make it worth their while, and the reduction in energy use would be huge. I believe such a scheme would be effective, popular, and relatively easily implemented.
I propose
A substantial CARBON TAX on all forms of energy, to include air travel, together with an annual issue of CARBON COUPONS to all individuals, whereby efficient use of those coupons would fully offset the tax, but overuse of energy would become highly expensive. There would develop a market price for those who lived within their allowance and had coupons to spare, thus providing the poor with a small supplementary (earned) income. It was possible for an effective coupon system to work during World War 2, so it should be just as easy to implement now.
