[The Weeping Angel]

My hope is, the universal negative feedback about the spring statement/benefit changes (some hugely overblown, some fair, some inevitable) will lead to closer European ties and more quickly to allow for a better economy and rapid easing of the cuts to those hardest hit. My worry is a hammering in the local elections spikes a panic and a rightward shift in pursuit of remain voters.

Doesn't matter what happens it will be not enough or it won't count because reasons.

[Tubby Isaacs]

I agree.

There's a very tedious strain of liberal left opinion that's completely unprepared to look at the trade offs in the era of Trump. Plus another that thinks everything we need can be taken off other people.

To some extent, it's the government's own fault for losing this part of its base, so has nobody to stand up for it. But they were probably counting on lots of people being able to weigh things up honestly. That might be a very optimistic assumption.

[Tubby Isaacs]

This isn't quite what I was talking about, but it's not a very generous take. Implication seems to be that the Government should have sorted this out in 5 months.

Some changes were made in March that will lead to more courts sitting, albeit not much more. Had that been happening before for years the backlog would be much lower. Beyond that there are some proposals to save money on imprisoning women, but they're a slow burner.

"Expert opinion" in literally every area wants more money spent on their area now. Expert opinion doesn't tend to want taxes raised on what they're experts on either. Of course, this is what we pay governments to negotiate, but we should judge them on progress over a longer period than 8 months.

[Tubby Isaacs]

This is positive, but down to Sunak-Bozo policy, in fairness to them.

UK carbon emissions fell by 4% in 2024, official figures show
Less use of gas and coal in electricity supply and industry sectors drove reduction, Department for Energy says

[Tubby Isaacs]

Not read the article- something proposing "courage" as the solution may not cut it anyway- but Blunkett was in government with a strict fiscal rule too. The bit of the rule that's causing problems- balancing current expenditure in 5 years time- doesn't seem particularly bad to me. The Treasury tends not to like investment spending either, but Reeves to her credit is trying to boost that.

[Boiler]

This is positive, but down to Sunak-Bozo policy, in fairness to them.

UK carbon emissions fell by 4% in 2024, official figures show
Less use of gas and coal in electricity supply and industry sectors drove reduction, Department for Energy says

Nice little snapshot here, which warms my heart (from https://grid.iamkate.com/)

Screenshot 2025-03-27 at 16-44-59 National Grid Live.png (112.76 KiB) Viewed 5979 times

Note also the minus signs, which means we're exporting electricity too.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Thank you.

Surprised at how high wind is given that onshore wind was basically banned by Cameron and others. I suppose they do deserve some credit for backing offshore wind though.

How do you see the near(ish) future? Capacity for fairly easy improvement?

[Tubby Isaacs]

At Spring Statement, the government is increasing capital spending by a further £13 billion over the Parliament to support growth‑enhancing investments including infrastructure, housing, and defence innovation.

Neoliberal austerity latest. Capital spending was raised by £100bn over the Parliament in the Budget too.

Think it's unlikely Reform and the Tories would be doing this, but apparently there's no difference.

[Boiler]

Thank you.

Surprised at how high wind is given that onshore wind was basically banned by Cameron and others. I suppose they do deserve some credit for backing offshore wind though.

How do you see the near(ish) future? Capacity for fairly easy improvement?

I think the near future will need much greater investment in the actual supply infrastructure, which will upset a lot of people because pylons (I am, unsurprisingly, one of those people who actually like them). I'm not sure how practical it would be to use heavier gauge conductors on existing pylons but a year of two ago there were definite upgrades being made to the pylons around here. You'll need this for EV charging* and the growth of heat pumps. This might require upgrading domestic incomers too. Quite what this will mean for the actual generational capacity, I have no idea... but it is interesting to note that recently, I was standing at the cemetery looking at the turbines in the distance and noted that not all were turning; they can be braked when the energy capacity at that time is not needed.

*BYD have announced a battery platform that can charge fully in five minutes. Trouble is, to achieve that it needs a 1000V supply at 1000A. Or put another way, a whole megawatt. That's many houses' worth.

https://electrek.co/2025/03/26/byds-new ... next-week/

[The Weeping Angel]

I agree.

There's a very tedious strain of liberal left opinion that's completely unprepared to look at the trade offs in the era of Trump. Plus another that thinks everything we need can be taken off other people.

To some extent, it's the government's own fault for losing this part of its base, so has nobody to stand up for it. But they were probably counting on lots of people being able to weigh things up honestly. That might be a very optimistic assumption.

In an age of social media you can forgot that. Someone who I follow on Bluesky made the observation that because the government give off right-wing or centre-right vibes left/liberal types online think the government is right-wing or at least is a continuation of the last govt.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Thank you.

Surprised at how high wind is given that onshore wind was basically banned by Cameron and others. I suppose they do deserve some credit for backing offshore wind though.

How do you see the near(ish) future? Capacity for fairly easy improvement?

I think the near future will need much greater investment in the actual supply infrastructure, which will upset a lot of people because pylons (I am, unsurprisingly, one of those people who actually like them). I'm not sure how practical it would be to use heavier gauge conductors on existing pylons but a year of two ago there were definite upgrades being made to the pylons around here. You'll need this for EV charging* and the growth of heat pumps. This might require upgrading domestic incomers too. Quite what this will mean for the actual generational capacity, I have no idea... but it is interesting to note that recently, I was standing at the cemetery looking at the turbines in the distance and noted that not all were turning; they can be braked when the energy capacity at that time is not needed.

*BYD have announced a battery platform that can charge fully in five minutes. Trouble is, to achieve that it needs a 1000V supply at 1000A. Or put another way, a whole megawatt. That's many houses' worth.

https://electrek.co/2025/03/26/byds-new ... next-week/

Cheers. I'd never even heard of braking wind turbines, so all this you're telling me is informative.

[Andy McDandy]

Braking wind.

Giggle.

[Tubby Isaacs]

[Boiler]

Here you go, Tubbs:

https://eximwind.com/how-the-braking-sy ... -turbines/

[Tubby Isaacs]

Thanks.

I'm surprised I haven't seen a "you know wind power is so shit, it even has to have brakes" story yet. But it makes perfect sense.

[The Weeping Angel]

Thanks.

I'm surprised I haven't seen a "you know wind power is so shit, it even has to have brakes" story yet. But it makes perfect sense.

On the Labour's future facebook group there's one poster who when she isn't lashing out at the govt over WFA and disability cuts is also ranting on about Net Zero which costs £600 billion.

[Boiler]

On the Labour's future facebook group there's one poster who when she isn't lashing out at the govt over WFA and disability cuts is also ranting on about Net Zero which costs £600 billion.

It'll cost a lot more if we carry on as we are (or worse still, revert) and lose large chunks of land to the sea - a lot of which is farm land. Those "Escape Route" signs are still pretty prominent in East Anglia and the East Midlands coast.

[Boiler]

Thanks.

I'm surprised I haven't seen a "you know wind power is so shit, it even has to have brakes" story yet. But it makes perfect sense.

The detractors would have to understand how it works first and not just whine about "bird-chomping eyesores"... round here there's enough noise coming from the anti-solar farm types. I was at a leisure centre in Crawley the other week and noticed they're taking a leaf out of the French book and installing solar panels in its car park - the cars park underneath. Pretty neat, huh?

[Tubby Isaacs]

I had a nice exchange with Jonathan Portes.

If I understand him correctly, Reeves committed to meet the OBR's scoring of her fiscal rules in every statement. Seeing the OBR do two of those a year, that sounds like a mistake. Obviously there is a cost in not seeking to fill the fiscal hole everyone can see, but I don't see how they can keep reacting like this when there's bad news (which there might be a fair bit of in the coming years). Jonathan suggested that further freezing tax allowances would have been a better response than the benefit cuts, which sounds sensible if difficult politically.

[Tubby Isaacs]

The detractors would have to understand how it works first and not just whine about "bird-chomping eyesores"... round here there's enough noise coming from the anti-solar farm types. I was at a leisure centre in Crawley the other week and noticed they're taking a leaf out of the French book and installing solar panels in its car park - the cars park underneath. Pretty neat, huh?

Neat indeed. That sounds expensive compared to sticking a load more panels on farm land, which I support. Is it cost effective?