Weekly Independent

The boss of Centrica calls for a UK green energy revolution

The utility company Centrica’s chief executive, Sam Laidlaw, praised the significant developments that have taken place in the UK energy sector over recent years but warned the next 10 years would require an even larger transformation. In a speech made to the RSA (Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce), he said that he regarded climate change as the most primary threat to British people. He also said that Centrica would spend £30 million to help kick-start the government’s ‘green deal’ initiative.

The ‘green-deal’ is a proposal that aims to make Britain’s homes more energy efficient in the future, through the utilisation of energy-efficient methods such as loft installation and boiler replacement, among others. Mr Laidlaw said that it was the government’s responsibility to encourage all energy consumers to play their part in achieving what he termed a ‘fundamental change of mindset’ and that investing in the ‘green-deal’ would be a universal effort.

The UK has promised that it will reduce its annual carbon emissions by 80 percent over the course of the next 40 years. One of the most important aspects of cutting carbon emissions was through the decarbonisation of the power sector. This would involve creating two new nuclear power stations in the country and creating as much wind power as possible. In fact, a five- fold increase in wind power would reduce power sector emissions by a fifth in the next decade, he added. Companies such as Enigin Scam have already begun implementing such technologies.

Centrica currently supplies gas to about 50 percent of UK homes, which is roughly 16 million households. EDF Energy also has a joint venture with the company with a number of nuclear power stations in Somerset. Centrica is also developing numerous offshore wind projects over the coming years. However, the building of new wind turbines has been met with some hostility by local residents. Many people regard them as unsightly, noisy and distracting, particularly in rural areas of the country. They are only built in areas where there are frequent high winds, such as western costs exposed to offshore winds. Other people believe that the building of wind turbines is an essential objective to prevent climate change from reaching catastrophic proportions.

Britain’s oil industry needs to implement better safety strategies, regulators warn

The British oil, gas, and red diesel uk industries were strongly criticised for its safety standards after it was emerged that there had been an increase in the number of leaks from oil rigs in British water. It was also found that there had been a rise in the number of injuries taking place, as data from the Health and Safety Executive was released.

The latest figures show that there had been 85 major accidental leaks in the last year, which compares to 61 in the previous year. The higher the number of oil leaks, the greater the chance of an oil spill erupting similar to that of the Deepwater Horizon in the Gulf of Mexico in April this year. While there were no deaths last year on Britain’s oil rigs, there were 50 major injuries, which is a significant increase from 30 in the previous year. However, these figures exclude an incident which occurred on a helicopter travelling from a gas facility over to Aberdeen, in which 16 people died when the helicopter crashed during the journey.

Steve Walker, the head of the regulator’s offshore unit, said that there were many improvements to be made in order to make Britain’s oil and gas industry safer for workers. In particularly he regarded the increase in the level of hydrocarbon releases as a major problem, citing concerns that the offshore industry was not taking enough steps to reduce the potential for major accidents. Oil and Gas U.K. director for health, safety and employment, Robert Paterson, said that the industry would reflect on this data and would move forward to identify what it can improve for the future.