A Big Lie?
I think it was Dr Goebbels who said that the art of propaganda was that if you are going to tell a lie - tell a big one. And so it is with wind power.
As I’ve already told you in my opinion those under water power lines leading to the wind turbines out at sea are there for the purposes of driving the sails round; not for harvesting electric power “generated“ by those turbines. That’s all propaganda to give the impression that something is happening on the green energy front.
There are a number of wind farms off the East Anglian coast and finishing touches are just being applied to the Greater Gabbard wind farm that will double the number of turbines out there. This is where the “big lie” comes in, as the authorities could not help saying that plans are in preparation to build an additional wind farm further out to sea that will dwarf the existing provision. And to prove it they had some film of work being undertaken out at sea on new turbines but gave away the whole plot by allowing us a glimpse of the Suffolk shoreline and the Sizewell Nuclear Power Station!
It is well known that an additional reactor is to be built there. No wonder. The power demands creating by the need to drive all these new “turbines” must be immense. To tell you the truth I think I’m losing count of where we are reactorwise at Sizewell. I am pretty sure the original reactor, “A”, is now decommissioned but Sizewell B is still going. I was at the County Council when the planning application for “B” was under discussion. Lord Marshall (no relation) used to come out for regular discussions with the Chief Executive, the Planning Officer and the Leader. He was always driven up in the CEGBs stretched Volvo limousine, which was parked in the courtyard. The main Committee Room overlooked the courtyard car park.
It was a commodious courtyard with a separate entrance and exit and wide enough to park cars either side, end on, leaving plenty of room for a central drive through access road. The only staff allowed access were Chief Officers, Deputy Chief Officers and senior personnel in the Chief Executives Department. Unfortunately one of these failed to realise that the parked stretched limo, with about 5 feet of back end sticking out into the access road, ought to be driven around with the result that he drove straight into it just outside the main committee Room and watched by the aforesaid Lord Marshall and a host of dignitaries. I don’t think the meeting went too well after that.
Still Planning Consent was forthcoming eventually and Sizewell B was duly built. At the far end of the beach, and with great foresight, the owner of the Beach Café renamed it “Sizewell T.” I reckon that there is probably just enough frontage left to cram in Sizewells C to S (inclusive) without needing to disturb or rename the café.
Solar Panels
Now these are different – to wind turbines - and actually work. I’ve just had 21 fitted on my south facing, unshaded roof and they look spectacular. Mind you there’s not a lot of roof left to see.
Having already had about 9 inches of insulation put in the loft I’m beginning to wonder if the structure is able to take all this additional weight.
The installation was done on a very bright and hot day and when it was complete Liam switched on and showed me how it worked. By now it was midday and the meter that showed, by a flashing red LED, how much electricity was being generated was going like the clappers. Apparently my unit of payment is every time the LED flashes so that was quite impressive. There was more to come. Liam took me out to the meter cupboard and we looked at the meter. “Going round pretty fast, isn’t it,” he said nodding towards the horizontal rotating disk under the dials. “Yes,” I replied, “But have you noticed anything unusual?” “No.” “It’s going backwards,” he explained but I still don’t really know I he was having me on.
As I write the sun is blazing down in this Indian Summer we are having and the LED is almost flashing itself off the wall. I reckon on a bright day they probably have to take Sizewell off line because of my roof. Still that should enable everyone to get ready for powering up the huge numbers of new wind generators still to come.
The Suffolk Scribbler
62
THE TERRIER - Autumn 2011
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