World’s biggest cable-laying vessel will link Moroccan renewables with Devon substationread a headline in a UK mainsteam news website recently. A project to feed power from the Sahara Desert to Britain moved a step closer to fruition as its financial backers prepare to commission the giant cable-laying ship.
A purpose built 700ft long cable laying vessel will, according to the plan, lay four parallel cables linking solar and wind farms spread across the desert in Morocco with a substation in Alverdiscott, a tiny village near the coast of north Devon. A cable 1400 miles (2,200 Km) long under some very wild parts of the Atlantic ocean? What could go wrong?
On paper it sounds a great idea but the practical side isn't quite a simple.
We live in a world that is becoming more unstable by the day with wars in Ukraine, and the Middle East, the Red Sea becoming a no go zone for European and American shipping, and food and energy security threatened on all sides.
The question that probably has not been asked because it should have been asked first is who will have political control of this part
of the Sahara in say 10 years time when this project is completed? Morocco is a reasonably stable country by African standards but if tensions between the Islamic world and the west continue to increase who knows how Morroccans will feel about selling their sunshine to a hostle power. Have the people seeking to make a quick buck out of the cable considered that the political control and turmoil
engulfing the Suez canal now was a problem mooted when it was built. The
Suez crisis was only 70 years ago, but thanks to television and the internet people have short memories.
Even
so it is not unreasonable to expect the people promoting this idea to
have heard of the disruption caused to trade (particularly oil and gas
shipments, by the current problems in the Red Sea region.
Would the money be better off invested on modular nuclear reactors?
Reports revealed that Xlinks, the company behind the project, expects the ship to cost several hundred million pounds (ah, so it isn't built yet?) and be capable of carrying 200 miles of power cables, coiled and ready for deployment on the seafloor.
If the scheme ever progresses beyond the planning stage the cable link is expected to deliver about 3.6 gigawatts of electricity to the UK’s national grid – equating to about 8pc of total power demand.
James Humfrey, new chief executive of subsidiary Xlinks First, said the vessel would lay two 100-mile lengths of cable at a time, then head back to the UK for the next two lengths.On returning it would pick up the cable ends, connect them to the next lengths and repeat the process. Commissioning of the ship is expected later this year.
Mr Humfrey said: “This will offer a near constant, clean and affordable supply of electricity to the UK and play a key role in Morocco and the UK’s future prosperity.” The Xlinks scheme involves laying cables carrying high voltage direct current power along the coasts of Spain, Portugal and France, coming ashore in North Africa.There, they will connect with seven solar farms and up to 1,000 wind turbines built across an area of Moroccan desert roughly the size of greater London.
Just over two years ago at the time of writing, many European nations and EU member states were keeping energy costs down and their economies competitive by importing cheap gas and oil from Russia. When war broke out in Ukraine economic sanctions on Russia cut off that source of fuel for industry and commerce, thus the economies of countries that had become dependent on cheap Russian imports were hit harder by the sanctions than the intended target, with Germany being transformed from an industrial powerhouse to the 'sick man of europe' as its economy slipped into recession.
Are we prepared to again tie our economic stability and prosperity to a source that can be immediately cut by hostile nations (as shown by a certain gas pipeline recently)?? Britain and other west European nations need to build a resilient low cost energy system while commissioning the construction of Small Nulcear Reactors quickly and removing NIMBY and ecoloon impediments.
There is nothing technically unworkable about laying international undersea cables, defenders of this scheme and followers of The Church of Scienceology Cult will be quick to point out there are SEVERAL different cables like this across the channel and North Sea already - carrying 25% of UK electricity supply from cheaper Norwegian hydroelectric, Danish, Dutch Irish or Belgium wind or French Nuclear that we have to import due to the shortfally caused by underperforming 'sustainables'..
The difference is Denmark, Norway and The
Netherlands are friendly nations. Morocco? A date palm republic. I don't
think they grow bananas there. Electricity may be cheap to produce in Norway,
Denmark etc. but those producers make us long suffering consumers in the
UK pay premium rates for it. Do you really think Moroccan solar farm
operators will be giving their energy away once they know we are dependent on
it to keep the lights on and the wheels turning.
The biggest political flaw in the scheme is that we would extend dependency on external sources, and sources that are not as politically reliable as those across the Channel or The North Sea. Protecting cables in the well patrolled English Channel and North Sea is a somewhat different proposition to protecting much longer cables under 1300 miles the open seas of the Atlantic.It has been noted that Russian vessels have been monitoring the location of all these cables, plus the connections from offshore wind farms recently? It's unlikely that this action was merely idle curiosity.
REPORT - Houthis Knock Out Several Undersea Internet Cables In Red Sea - Zero Hedge
There are new reports saying Yemen's Houthis have knocked out several underwater telecommunications cables linking Europe and Asia, however accounts of the extent of damage remain conflicting.
Multiple Israeli publications are reporting Monday that four underwater communications cables between Saudi Arabia and Djibouti have been damaged in recent months - the result of Houthi sabotage. The reporting appears to have originated in Israel's financial daily outlet Globes.
Energy self-sufficiency is guaranteed for at least decades if our political leaders could muster sufficient testicular fortitude to stand up to the ecoloons and give the order to exploit on-shore shale gas and offshore gas and oil wells as well as the vast reserves of coal on with our island sits.. Wind and solar plus essential back-up for when the wind refuses to blow and the sun does not shine is just too expensive to consider during a climate non-crisis. Check the data against modelled predictions.
Is Carbon Dioxide (CO2) Really A Pollutant Or Are The Green Blob Scamming Us all
A new study has been published in the journal Global Ecology and Conservation, which claims that a phenomenon known as CO2 fertilization is contributing to increased greening of the globe. The authors of the study, “The global greening continues despite increased drought stress since 2000”, used the measurement of Leaf Area Index (LAI) to shows that more than half of the land area on earth is greening at an accelerated rate since 2000.
Thousands Of Tractors Blocks Berlin Traffic Over Plan To End Diesel Subsidy
Thousands of German truck drivers, farmers, and agricultural workers parked in front of the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin yesterday as another massive protest over the government's 'green' plans to end tax breaks on diesel fuel and subsidies to farmers prevented from getting the best out of their land by loonytoons EU 'rewilding' policies.
German Farmers target nation's vice chancellor in subsidies protest
German farmers angered by cost-saving plans impacting the country's agricultural sector blocked the EU state’s vice chancellor from disembarking a ferry on Thursday, in a protest that was criticized by both government and opposition figures. The farmer's ager was triggered by financial cutbacks imposed by EU policy on member state’s agricultural industries have.
Germany Burns Net Zero Pledges And Fires Up Coal Generating Plants Ahead Of Winter Peak Electricity Season
On Wednesday this week Germany's coalition government approved putting coal power plants back online until the end of March 2024 to ensure energy security when natural gas supplies cannot meet demand. Though Germany has for at least a decade vied with Britain to claim leadership of Europe's ill - advised push for net zero, the Berlin government has been forced into this move
Environmentalists Hype The Summer Heat, Ignore The Winter Chill And Call Ity Science
According to Daniel Turner, founder and executive director of the nonprofit climate change scepticism advocacy group Power the Future, who insists that environmental activists are hyping up heat events such as the hot weather parts of the United States and southern Europe seeing right now. While mainstream media reporters are whipping themselves into a frenzy over the summer's heat, the kind of temperatures being recorded should not be causing surprise ...
Scientists says Nuclear Is The Way Forward For Clean Energy - Do Ursidae Defecate In Sylvan Landscapes?
Scientists, politicians and media have been screeching, for the past 30 or so years, about the need to transition away from carbon based fossil fuels, (coal, gas and oil,) as a matter or urgency or risk destroying the life supporting ecology of our planet by overloading the system with Carbon Dioxide (CO2) emitted from human activity. Next they'll be informing us, in their lofty and condescending way that yes, bears do actually shit in the woods.
Implosion of Germany's Green Party Threatens To Destabilse EU
With the defeat of Donald Trump in the 2020 US election, the far left parties in Liberal Democracies celebrated the defeat of the far right. At around the same time it appeared that Germany's AfD party, Italy's Lega and and the Sweden Democrats had been discredited and surges in their popularity had been halted by negative propaganda campaigns while Germany's Green Party were at the height of their popularity and were hailed as Europe's great hope for a clean, net zero, woke, gay and trans friendly future.
Thousands of Dutch farms will be forced out of business to meet new EU 'Nitrogen pollution targets
he globalist technocrats who control The European Union (EU) have enacted new environmental protection laws which will force member states, including The Netherlands, to meet the new targets for reducing emissions, which address nitrogen emissions from human activity rather than Carbon Dioxide, the Netherlands government proposes to shut down a large portion of its farming industry in order to comply with emissions targets ...
Minister's Claim That 40% UK Energy Comes From Renewables Is Technically Illiterate
Britain's newly installed Secretary of State for Energy, Grant Shapps, is still learning the job so perhaps we should cut him some slack, but even so a statement he made on our energy supply today shows astounding ignorance of technical details relating to his portfolio.
Answering a question in Parliament this morning about Britain's ability to reach its target of getting 40% of our energy needs from sustainable sources, Shapps sneered that it was not possible for us to reach 40% now as we already get 43% from wind. Unfortunately the sneering sarcasm was misplaced but served to reveal the man in charge of energy policy does not know the difference between energy and electricity.
The True Cost Of The Green Energy Boom Is Now Being Realized
For four decades we have been fed a constant stream of propaganda assuring us that green energy was the only way forward if we wanted to secure supplies of the energy essential to a modern society while preventing the environmental catastrophes that would be the inevitable consequence of climate change caused by the Carbon Dioxide (CO2) emitted by human industrial, commercial and social activity. ... Continue reading >>>
Do We Have A Winter Of Civil Disobedience Ahead?
As many people in Britain slap on the apres sun gloop in the wake of what passes for a heatwave in these cool cloudy climes, our inept politicians caught with their pants down by unusual weather as usual have heard that that winter is coming and are making plans for a coldwave.
We are in the grip of an energy crisis at the height of summer. Last week, it was reported that the UK government is laying down plans for a “reasonable worst-case scenario” including blackouts for industry and even households. And this is as energy prices spiral out of control to new records every day.
A Mostly Wind- & Solar-Powered US Economy Is A Dangerous Fantasy
When President Biden and other advocates of wind and solar generation speak, they appear to believe that the challenge posed is just a matter of currently having too much fossil fuel generation and not enough wind and solar; and therefore, accomplishing the transition to "net zero" will be a simple matter of building sufficient wind and solar facilities and having those facilities replace the current ones that use the fossil fuels.
Debunked: The Great Renewable Green Delusion
The war in Ukraine has not caused the global energy crisis of early 2022 byt merely exacerbated it. Currently the nations currently in conflict with Russia over its incursion into Ukraine are those which are most dependent for their energy needs on Russian oil and gas. And now their loonytoons 'net zero' green energy policies have failed they are biting the hand that feeds them.
Has The Green Blob's War On Fossil Fuels Been Lost On The Battlefields Of Ukraine
With some energy sector opinion makers already pronouncing the 'net zero' agenda is already dead as oil and gas supplies from Russia dry up due to NATO / EU sanctions and Moscow's retaliatory export bans which have only been in force a week at the most, governments in the liberal democracies of Europe and North America are already talking about starting up redundant coal and nuclear power stations, the UK, Netherlands and other nations with offshore gas operations in the North Sea are suddenly finding that it may now be economically viable to start pumping again and (whisper it ever so quietly,) coal is coming back into the reckoning as an energy source ...
We Told You So - Government-funded Report Confirms World’s Largest offshore Wind Farm is UnprofitableA report commissioned by the Norwegian government has contradicted Boris Johnson’s recent claim that offshore wind costs have fallen by 70% in a decade. The report also blows a huge hole in Johnson's grandiose pledges to the COP26 conference that offshore wind power would propel Britain to its net - zero target for Carbon Dioxide emissions well before 2050, the target set by the climate conference for achieving that target.
Climate change: Electrical industry’s ‘dirty secret’ boosts warming
Scaremongering IPCC Pushes Climate Hysteria with New Doomsday Report
Billionaire Investor Erik Prince Launches Fund For Electric Car Metals
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