Then I'll keep this short. People who claim renewables are reliable are suspect. Aggregation only reliably works for massively over-sized networks of diverse tech with vastly diverse geographical deployments (continental to planetary), at which scale geopolitics is an energy security risk again.
By "buy more from the French" do you mean buy more electricity from them via the interconnect or buy more nuclear power plants?
I think the only practical application of renewable storage is at the tens of kWh class in homes for buffering local solar. It does not scale to national level.
So, it's incredibly hard to get out of this situation nationally. But as individuals, we can build our own solar generators on our houses with our own batteries and opt to use our own cheaper electricity (tho not free - we had to invest ££) in preference to buying it from the grid market suppliers.
If we set up a nationalised generation company to build our own new generators, we'd have to find the tax ££ to invest in new plant and then the private generation companies would rightly cry foul for us using state aid to unfairly compete with them as intentionally loss-making generators.
And because the plant we have are now all privately owned, to nationalise them you'd have to buy them back and compensate the owners for their future losses. Remember they were sold a deal where if they built the plant, they could reap the rewards of selling electricity for the life of the plant.
Power plants are basically giant steam engines. And like any steam engine, you need to light a fire in the boiler and wait for the water to boil into steam. Nuclear is the same. The nuclear fuel heats water to make steam. It's not like a car engine that you can just turn on and go.
But, it's a lot of tax money to find (borrow). And you have to justify it being spent on generating plant that you intend to NOT use.
Worse, is the way backup plant works. It runs all the time, as "spinning reserve" so it can act as backup instantly (it takes a lot of time to start up from cold).
A national generation company could just invest tax ££ in building, maintaining and depreciating redundant backup plant. Intentionally leaving it idle and only paying the higher fuel cost when needed. It's how the UK used to build power plants via the Central Electricty Generating Board (CEGB).
Possibly. Generation was privatised to shift the high cost of plant investment to private companies. They recover their investment and make money from profits on selling the electricity over the lifetime of the plant (decades). So you have to make it profitable or they see no reason to invest.
This all supposes you keep with electricity being a private business market. If you nationalised it and ran it not-for-profit and accepted the cost of building & operating backup generation for renewables at a permanent loss, that would work (you'd still pay for it in your taxes or energy bills).
If you build lots of renewables with storage and the marginal rate prices gas and nuclear generators out of the market and they close and decommission their loss-making generators, you'll need to guarantee that you'll NEVER need a backup generator for the renewables.
Current renewables without batteries are never going to set the market rate. Their guaranteed deliverable energy and power is close to zero. Even with battery storage, you would need enough generation and storage for many days, if not weeks of stored energy.
If we build enough nuclear or enough renewables with huge terrawatt.hour (TWh) class batteries to guarantee delivery, then those cheaper producers would set the marginal market rate. More expensive generators like gas would then have to sell at a loss and would be squeezed out of the market.
The kicker is that the other generators then get paid that rate as well for what they sell into the grid, even if they are cheaper. So renewables aren't cheap (for end users). The companies just make more profit. Whichever generating tech enables supply of all the demand, guaranteed, sets the rate.
Because of marginal wholesale pricing. To guarantee electricity supply, the market settlement pays the most expensive guaranteed generators rate (which is natural gas fired). Renewables are much cheaper but cannot be relied upon, so the rate is set so that gas plant can meet demand.
I'm sure that will come with time, after you're settled in a new place of your own.
People more keenly feel alone and exposed when under stress and especially when ill. Hope you are starting to recover from your cold or whatever that was.
Screenshot of Trump on his socials (12 Mar 2026 6:14am): "The United States is the largest Oil Producer in the World, by far, so when oil prices go up, we make a lot of money."
Well, he came out and said the quiet part loud.
Trump is in this war for the money.
Nice to have you on Bluesky. Ditching the Mush X cesspit.
Ah, that 'special relationship' that looks like an abusive, power hungry, narcisistic, coercive controlling, gaslighting soon-to-be ex-partner relationship.
Headline from the Mirrow.co.uk 4th March 2026. "UK government set to start flights back from Middle East as cancellations near..."
Contrast Trump & Rubio's abandonment of their own citizens with the British response.
Trapped US citizens are reportedly "very disappointed" with the administration's lack of commitment to them. Trump is no Franklin D. Roosevelt, that's for sure.
Hear me out... Trump's angle is:
☑️ Invade Venezuela & take their oil & gas.
☑️ Start a war in the middle east.
☑️ Make $$ from weapons.
☑️ Stop OPEC oil & gas deliveries.
☑️ Force up the global price of oil & gas.
☑️ Make $$ from US & Venezuelan oil & gas.
BBC News headline Ttump 'not happy' with Starmer over lack of support for day 1 of Iran war.
Ask me how many f**ks I give about how Trump is mad that Starmer refused to be a good dog and join in on an illegal war on nothing but his whim.
Iraq was bad enough and we actually went through the proper process to justify the attack (even if it was later found suspect).
There's massive additional spending feeding through:
Two child CB cap scrapped
Winter Fuel payments restored
Partial reversal of NI hike
Transfer of ECO levies from energy bills to gov't budget
Defence spending
Can they sustain the one year lower deficit, let alone the huge y-o-y surplus needed? 🤔
Reeves "miracle" of deficit reduction was a combination of:
Lower inflation. Lower the forecast cost of purchases.
Lying about a "black hole" to raise taxes (income tax threshold fiscal drag, CGT threshold cuts, Employers NI hike, betting tax...) to boost tax receipts.
But there's negatives too..
We currently spend more on debt interest than Defence or Transport and Public Order combined. It's our 4th largest expenditure.
As our debt gets more out of control, our credit rating falls & yield rates increase. When £2.9tn refinances at 5.5% it will cost £159bn/yr - more than Education.
Also in context...
UK annual GDP = £2.8tn but debt = £2.9tn.
UK budget deficit = ~+£55bn borrowed PER YEAR
If they get the budget deficit to ZERO that just means not borrowing more and covering the yield payouts (£126bn/yr and rising as low yield bonds refinance at higher yields (~5.5% for 30yr).
Evidently, Trump didn't read the ASI playbook to the part where the ASI removes all executive power from the President and human government, for the precise reasons that can be seen in Trump's unhinged, drunk on power posts that it's currently being trained on.
There's a possibility that AI & robotics simply end the monetary system.
They offer almost unlimited work capacity (both mental and physical labour) for the price of the raw materials to build them & electricity. The cost of all products & services then becomes raw materials (the electric is free).
We are at a societal stage where sufficient financial growth for escape (for us) is unlikely.
Most of the growth areas you cite are either a product of AI and robotics (fiscal growth without people) or unattainable by the UK - AI & robotics are dominated by US & China multi-trillion $ companies.
It is possible for multiple things to be true at the same time.
We have borrowed too much.
We cannot cut spending to borrow less, borrow more to avoid cuts, tax more to avoid borrowing or cuts or tax less without borrowing more or cuts... without ruinous effects.
The trap has sprung.
