Guardian Big Energy Debate: Glasgow

Ian Arbon looks back at the key points from the Glasgow round of the Guardian Big Energy Debate.

I found the event very useful and considerably different from the so-called ‘debates’ I usually attend, where I seem to be the only person present with any real knowledge of ‘energy’!

This was the first time that I had attended an event where engineers/technical people were in the majority and the outcome was very unusual;  everyone agreed that neither Westminster nor Holyrood had a coherent energy strategy or had any genuine likelihood of meeting its 2020 energy or emissions targets.  I have not yet seen any report from the Guardian people so don’t know how clearly this will be reported but it was certainly an unexpected outcome.

One very important outcome from the debate was the recognition that all of the UK’s natural gas reserves were in the English sector of the North Sea, so all of Scotland's natural gas requirements (both for heating and power stations), representing more than 50% of Scotland’s total energy needs have to be transmitted from England by pipeline (except for a small amount stripped from crude oil at St Fergus).  There are no interconnectors to other countries and no plans for an LNG terminal in Scotland so, in the event of independence, all of Scotland’s gas requirement would have to be transmitted via England.  The potential political fall-out of this is enormous but I have never heard the issue even discussed!  Again, I don’t know how much the Guardian will pick up on this point but I think it would be worth disseminating in IMechE.