Comment

Advocates of new nuclear power stations in Scotland are using threats of power cuts to promote their cause. Graham Stein shows that these are unfounded scare tactics we've seen before.

Scotland: will the lights go out without
new nuclear power stations?

With the Hunterston B nuclear power station due for closure in 2011 (though its life may be extended) and the expected closure of Longannet and Cockenzie coal-fired stations in 2015, Scotland will lose one of its two nuclear stations and both its coal-fired ones.

It might, therefore, be assumed that this will cause serious problems in meeting electricity demand. Indeed, these three power stations have a total capacity of 4,646MW, an amount greater than Scotland’s average electricity demand of around 4,000MW.

But Scotland currently has a massive overcapacity in electricity generation, due in part to the unnecessary building of Torness nuclear power station (more of which later).

In all there is about 9,500MW of available generating capacity (excluding wind power), so the closures will bring this down to around 4,800MW, which is below peak demand of around 6,200MW. But by 2010 additional capacity of at least 914MW of gas, hydro and biomass stations will have been built and 779MW of Peterhead's capacity can be made available through grid strengthening. [1] And a total of 2,000MW or more (540MW average output) of wind power is likely to have been built. [2][3]

This will mean that by 2010, excluding Hunterston B, Longannet and Cockenzie, generating capacity will be at least 7,000MW [4] which is higher than peak demand of 6,200MW, but would leave a relatively low margin to allow for non-availability of plant. However, given the interconnections with England and Northern Ireland, the safe capacity margin can be lower than would be required for an isolated system. There is also scope for additional renewable (or conventional) plant being built between 2010 and the closure of Longannet and Cockenzie in 2015.

The next key event will be the closure of the 1,250MW Torness nuclear power station, which is currently set for 2023, though its operator British Energy is already talking about an extension to its operating life. [5] If it closes on schedule, this would drop Scotland's generating capacity to 5,750MW, which is below current peak demand. This means that beyond 2010 further new generating capacity and/or energy efficiency measures will be required to ensure generating capacity can meet demand. But we are looking at least 18 years into the future, which gives plenty of time to plan for having adequate generating capacity.

It doesn't mean the lights are about to go out, and claims that new nuclear power stations are needed in Scotland to meet demand are spurious.

That MPs and MSPs are making such claims in parliament and in the press may in part be due to misinformation from the nuclear industry’s spin doctors. But it might also be cynical scare tactics to try to foist an uneconomic and unsustainable energy source on a wary public.

One of the most vociferous advocates of new nuclear reactors, John Home Robertson MSP, is happy to use these tactics. [6] His constituency includes Torness nuclear power station, a significant local employer, so he may feel justified in using dishonest claims.

Turn the clock back thirty years to the time when the South of Scotland Electricity Board (SSEB) was seeking to build that power station at Torness in the face of considerable opposition.

At the public inquiry in 1974 (which lasted a mere eight days) the SSEB argued that this new power station was necessary to meet the growing demand for electricity. But in 1995 the truth came out when the director of corporate communications for Scottish Nuclear, which then ran the plant, unwittingly admitted: "The decision to build Torness was not based on a need for generating capacity." Building Torness (and Heysham in England) was "to support the UK engineering industry through what was obviously going to be a lean period". [7]

It is debatable as to what the outcome of the public inquiry would have been had such honesty been shown at the time. But with the help of the SSEB’s scare tactics, Torness got the go-ahead and Scotland was lumbered with a massive generating overcapacity.

The power station was later to be labeled a “£2.5 billion mistake” by Scottish Office ‘sources’. [8] That was £2.5 billion which could have been put to much better use than propping up a failing nuclear industry.

Are we to be conned all over again?

 

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Notes

[1] “Power for Scotland – The non-nuclear one” by Bill Robertson

[2] Because wind power depends on the strength of the wind, its ‘installed capacity’ can be misleading when compared to conventional power stations. An average output of 500MW from wind power would require an installed capacity of around 2,000MW (though precise figures depend on the siting of individual wind farms). However, this should not be seen as inefficiency, as claimed by detractors, including Scotland’s chief scientific adviser Professor Wilson Sibbett.* Far from it, it is maximizing the available resource.

And those people who wrongly portray wind power as inefficient, aren’t as quick to mention that the UK’s nuclear power stations (and fossil-fueled stations, excluding combined heat and power) only have a thermal efficiency of around 28-40%. In terms of a wasted resources, this truly is inefficient.

* “Country 'needs nuclear power'” by Eddie Barnes and Murdo MacLeod, Scotland on Sunday, 15 May 2005

[3] These figures give a total averge output from renewables of over 1,000MW, or 25% of Scottish electricity consumption – easily surpassing the Scottish Executive's 18% target.

[4] Although output from wind power cannot be controlled in the same way as other forms of electricity generation, a recent study by Oxford University “Wind power and the UK wind resource” shows that: “Wind power in the UK produces, on average, more electricity at times when demand is highest, and less electricity when demand is low. This pattern of electricity production improves the reliability of wind power to meet demand.”

Wind power can be relied upon to generate around one quarter of its installed capacity at times of medium to high demand with a similar level of reliability as that of conventional generation.

[5] “Torness nuclear plant life to be extended”, Edinburgh Evening News, 8 December 2005; “Longer-life Scottish power stations may aid Blair's pro-nuclear rethink”, The Scotsman, 9 December 2005

[6] See for instance “This country needs new nuclear reactors” by John Home Robertson, Sunday Herald, 4 December 2005

[7] “Con trick”, New Scientist, 30 September 1995

[8] “Torness plant was 'a £2500m mistake’” by Alf Young, The Glasgow Herald, 10th November 1989. Attributed to ‘sources in the Scottish Civil Service’, the views were widely believed to be those of the then Secretary of State for Scotland, Malcolm Rifkind. The station was originally projected to cost £742 million.