Severn barrage dropped

[hyperD]

If there's no wind then someone can pedal... maybe a job for unemployed people.

You may laugh d000hg, but that is a far more sensible idea than windmills. Just think, when a million kettles are about to boil during the ad break in Corrie, vaste swathes of the unemployed could be whipped into pedalling for their lives on 5 million eco-bikes connected to the National Grid.

No uncertainty of the unpredictability of the wind, just a predictability of the fact that Chardonnay and her spawn of wasters won't get the 2 holidays to Spain this year if she doesn't get those KFC, genetically manipulated thunderthighs and muffin top working to generate that 1.6kW of power. And no need to provide them with the appropriate gear - they're all wearing tracksuits already.

I'd vote for that.

And the sweat released could be pooled into our reservoirs to help alleviate the leakage from our mains potable water system.

[Scrag Meister]

More beans anyone? Make your contribution to a greener Britain.

[gricerboy]

I could have done with a £30bn project on my doorstep, the sea would have turned blue too.

They'd have had to have repainted Hinkley Point a different colour to so that it matched the sea!

[d000hg]

I kind of like windmills, pretty. If there's no wind then someone can pedal... maybe a job for unemployed people.

[SupremeSpod]

Not until I pry the last windmill out of the ground or sea from this eco-brainwashed, unthinking, basketcase country full of bovine inhabitants, with my cold, dead hands.

Righty-o Mr Lancaster!

[hyperD]

Stop bloody whinging!

Not until I pry the last windmill out of the ground or sea from this eco-brainwashed, unthinking, basketcase country full of bovine inhabitants, with my cold, dead hands.

[SupremeSpod]

Excellent, so all these peak power following windmills when they don't rotate on a still day 80% of the time will be backed up by...

...fossil fuel burning gas or diesel power plants.

Number of fossil fueled power stations reduced in the UK: 0.

Quality.

Stop bloody whinging!

[hyperD]

Excellent, so all these peak power following windmills when they don't rotate on a still day 80% of the time will be backed up by...

...fossil fuel burning gas or diesel power plants.

Number of fossil fueled power stations reduced in the UK: 0.

Quality.

[gingerjedi]

Hurrah!

Much more would have been lost than gained had it gone ahead.

I could have done with a £30bn project on my doorstep, the sea would have turned blue too.

[TimberWolf]

How did it get costed at £30 billion.... that's a lot of money

That's probably the problem. Whoever did it would see this as a cash cow from which to milk the public purse, and the damn a secondary goal. A lump of concrete with some holes in it init.

[Troll]

How did it get costed at £30 billion.... that's a lot of money

[Moscow Mule]

Instead the Dutch will build our wind turbines

I thought there was a windmill factory in Southampton?

[cojak]

Hurrah!

Much more would have been lost than gained had it gone ahead.

[AtW]

"Industry leaders believe wind is on the verge of a major breakthrough in capacity, after figures showed that on 6 September, wind accounted for 10 per cent of the UK's supply."

That's not bad considering that:

"At present, 10 nuclear power stations in the UK generate around 13 per cent of our electricity"

I'd still go for nuclear option though - just in the the Earth stops rotating

[TimberWolf]

Huhne drops Severn barrage to invest in wind power - UK Politics, UK - The Independent

We can't build dams, they are too complicated. Instead the Dutch will build our wind turbines and the French our nuclear power stations. Talk about turning down a free lunch. Oh well, I expect the resulting dam would have been unambitious and would have needed pulling down in a couple of decades anyway.