Last night…

It fucking rained!!!

I hate the rain; my very clean car got wet! I have to take a
rain-proof jacket on my bike. It’s… wet!!! Stops you having fun
outdoors.

It’s always bloody rainin’ here.

Ok, it hasn’t rained for 6 weeks and the entire country is totally
desiccated. This ‘verdant isle’ is no longer verdant. It’s now ‘this
browndant isle’. Half of its on fire, despite the warning alarm on
Friday night, and reservoirs have run dry. The Thames still has water
but you really, really wouldn’t want to drink it.

So it’s a funny ole time to have a big discussion about ‘energy’. A
euphemism for ‘oil and gas’. The horns of the environmentalists devil.

Scotland have found an oil field, up by the Shetlands, and a gas one,
in the middle of the North Sea, 150 miles off the coast of Aberdeen.
So really convenient for popping out for milk and eggs. Possibly a bar
of chocolate. Uber Eats will not deliver there. And the oil companies
have built their drilling facilities, all the way out there. But they
need a license to drill. And the government must decide to give them
one. As they sit there on, probably, 100 million, 200 million? pound
investment in the rig and pipes needed to ship it all to land.

Andy Burnnham is torn.Like, really torn. Between the horrendously
unfashionable dependence on fossil fuels, investing into the future of
carbon emissions they create. And the more pragmatic consideration of
‘energy independence’ and keeping warm next winter. Yes, winter will
definitely come. And probably be as horribly extreme as the summer.
And we can’t fill the hot water tank with environmental ideology. We
need ‘energy security’ and the current batch of wind farms and solar
panels can’t give us that. Only… hydrocarbons!! can do that.
Currently.

So is giving licenses to drill condemning us to more heatwaves due to
emissions? Or keeping us warm in the winter whilst we wait for
‘renewable’ sources to become more productive. (For ‘renewable’, read
‘nuclear’; its the only viable option. Except it scares the shit out
of most people.)

Consequently, they’ve shelved the decision for a few months. By which
time, Burnham hopes the heatwave has finished and it all becomes a
little less emotional.

Happy Tuesday

A xxxx