Energy in the 1980s - Looking Ahead

I have the challenging task of summing up in a notional twenty minutes this fascinating two day Discussion Meeting. First I will say something about the trends which have emerged from the papers and discussion. We began with the Secretary of State, who gave us a thoughtful paper showing a full recognition of the realities which constrain any power and energy policy. He told us that ‘ all energy predictions are wrong because of the great difficulty in predicting the demands and supplies’. He instanced this by saying that no one foresaw the North Sea development or the rapid progress with the breeder reactor, and went on to remind us that the balance between fuel sources may alter radically. So, from a policy-making angle we must have a flexible programme. He stressed the need to re-vitalize the coal industry, but warned us that new collieries take many years to bring in to production - as for instance, the 8-10 years for full production from the new Selby colliery. Turning to the problems of the nuclear power programme he suggested that we would be moving to a situation where development was more international than hitherto. Having begun with several nuclear consortia, we now had a single national design and construction firm with the resources needed for operating on a world scale.