UK “on the verge of going dark with widespread blackouts”

New research says that the UK might have blackouts within five years because a lot of power stations are closing down.

According to the think tank Public First, the country lacks sufficient methods to generate the amount of power lost.
Four nuclear power plants in the UK will be shut down by April 2028: Hartlepool, Heysham I and II, and Torness.

The last coal power plant in the country, Ratcliffe-on-Soar in Nottinghamshire, will close in September this year.

Drax Power, the company that runs the biomass-fuelled Drax power station in North Yorkshire,asked Public First to make a report called” Mind the Gap: Exploring Britain’s energy crunch. “

Delays in building Hinkley Point C could make the problem worse because more people want electricity from electric vehicles and heat pumps.

The new nuclear power station was supposed to start making electricity next year, but now it won’t be ready until at least 2031.

At the same time, the expected cost of building the facility in Somerset has gone up from £18 billion when it was first approved to £35 billion.

According to the Telegraph, Public First predicts that the UK will need7. 5GWmore power than it can provide by 2028.

Last year, gas was the main way we made electricity in the country. But according to National Grid data, wind power was actually used more than gas in January, October, and December.

Even though we use natural gas a lot, last year we made the least amount of electricity from fossil fuels since 1957.

The UK gets 56% of its energy from low carbon sources, but the government wants it to be 95% by 2030.

The French energy company EDF runs all eight nuclear power stations in Britain. They said last month that they will decide by the end of the year if they will keep Hartlepool, Torness, and Heysham I and II power stations operating for longer.

This morning, BBC Panorama said that Drax, the power company involved in the Public First report, has been burning wood from rare Canadian forests.

The company got£6 billion in environmentally friendly payments while its wood pellet-burning plant releases about 12 million tonnes of carbon dioxide every year, as reported by the BBC.