Other countries, including Sweden are urging the people to prepare for disasters, including wars, power outage and disasters in general.

www.bbc.co.uk/.../cjr4zwj2lgdo

What's the alternative?  With North Sea oil and gas rapidly running out, we're more and more reliant on imported oil and gas.  At least we've got our own wind and sun.

Simon Barker said:

At least we've got our own wind and sun.

Indeed. I would expect to be able to generate sufficient leccy for 8 - 10 months here on the south coast. It will never replace gas for heating, but it will help.

UK oil and gas is available, also coal.

These are what we should be using while transitioning.

Using foreign fuels is making us poorer, uncompetitive and dependent. That suits some people but not me.

UK oil and gas is available, also coal.

but not that can be extracted at any rate that matches our consumption. As older gas fields effectively dry up, the rate of production falls as we have to go after the deeper stuff. Horizontal high contact drilling helps you deplete the reserve faster, and levels off the decline for a while,  but does not get you any more in total There is no getting away from the fact that the last time gas came out of the sea fast enough to meet our full domestic demand was about 20 years ago.
Oil had its peak about 2004 and we became a net importer instead of a net exporter shortly after, and the economy has never recovered.

Coal we have more of, but again the easy to get stuff has largely been mined, leaving us with reserves uneconomic to extract.

 Very few folk heat their homes with coal or coke these days, and if you ever have, you will recall what a pain it is compared to gas, and its more expensive per  kW.

Mike.

There's no doubt that uk oil will end in the not to distant future.

But why shut production down completely now?

We do have 200 years of coal. And fraking gas is a serious contender to supply us while we transition to nuclear.

mapj1 said:

Very few folk heat their homes with coal or coke these days, and if you ever have, you will recall what a pain it is compared to gas, and its more expensive per  kW.

Not forgetting that house coal has not been available in England for a couple of years. And yes, sitting back and enjoying the warmth of gas CH is much easier than laying a fire and waiting for it to heat the room. When you had domestiques to do that for you before breakfast, it was less of a problem.

Granted, one can bank up a fire overnight, but it seems rather extravagant.

I am surprised that coal is more expensive. Without doubt, what one cannot do is to stockpile gas.

Jon Steward said:

transition to nuclear

Attitudes have changed. Let us not forget that nuclear power stations were closely linked to the weapons programme.

Safety margins (and accordingly, cost) seem excessive, which contributes to the huge lead times. Small nuclear reactors are to be found at sea, so why can they not be built in quantity for use on land.

As I posted in athother thread, small reactors may now actually become commercial reality with the drive from the big tech companies for reliable, not renewable energy.

The Chinese and the Russians have working examples such as:

Russia connects floating plant to grid - World Nuclear News

It's quite interesting to look through the WNN website for what is a rather positive outlook on nuclear power.

The reactors used in nuclear submarines are not suitable. They are designed to use HEU (highly enriched uranium also highly expensive uranium) with it's attended proliferation problems.

Roger B said:

The reactors used in nuclear submarines are not suitable. They are designed to use HEU (highly enriched uranium also highly expensive uranium) with it's attended proliferation problems.

Ah well, nobody told me those secrets. 

Still, step-daughter can see Heysham from the end of the road, and daughter could see Sizewell from school, so none of us worries about nuclear reactors. I am all in favour.

This article has some details of the Russian small reactor family:

https://www.neimagazine.com/analysis/the-ritm-200n-as-a-terrestrial-unit/?cf-view

The load following capabilities are interesting however they will be necessary for propulsion use. It uses HALEU which avoids the proliferation problems but is still more expensive than standard reactor grade.

This article has some details of the Russian small reactor family:

https://www.neimagazine.com/analysis/the-ritm-200n-as-a-terrestrial-unit/?cf-view

The load following capabilities are interesting however they will be necessary for propulsion use. It uses HALEU which avoids the proliferation problems but is still more expensive than standard reactor grade.