Trump’s Tariffs Threaten To Wipe Out UK’s Economic Growth
The title of this post is the same as that of this article on The Times.
This is the sub-heading.
Rachel Reeves could be forced to raise taxes or cut spending after the US president announced plans for tariffs of up to 25 per cent on cars
These three paragraphs add more detail.
Rachel Reeves faces having to raise taxes or cut spending if President Trump follows through on his threat to impose tariffs on Britain next week, the official budget watchdog has warned.
The chancellor was forced to announce a £14 billion package of cuts to repair the public finances in her spring statement after the Office for Budget Responsibility halved growth forecasts.
But the budget watchdog warned that there was a 50 per cent chance that Reeves would be forced to return with further cuts or tax rises as soon as October amid concerns that the UK’s economic outlook will deteriorate still further.
So I will hit back in the only way I can and avoid buying any goods made by US companies.
I have started by removing any US-owned products from my Ocado order on Saturday.
Backing Up The Wind With The Keadby Power Stations
I went to Cleethorpes from Doncaster by train yesterday. You pass the Keadby site, where there are two large gas–fired power stations of 734 MW and 710 MW. A third one ; Keadby 3 of 910 MW complete with carbon capture and storage should join them by 2027.
So that will be nearly 2.5 GW of reliable electricity.
I find it interesting that one of our first gas-fired power stations with carbon capture will be in Lincolnshire, which is famous for growing plants of all shapes, types and sizes. So will we be seeing lots of greenhouses on the flat lands I saw yesterday, growing plants in an atmosphere they like, so that we can generate our carbon dioxide and eat it.
The next power station at Keadby is called the Keadby Next Generation power station, which is intended to be complete by 2030. It is a bit of a puzzle in that it will run on up to 1800 MW of hydrogen and only produce up to 910 MW of electricity.
Note.
- The hydrogen will come from SSE’s hydrogen store at Aldbrough and Centrica’s store at Rough.
- Surely, the amount of hydrogen and electricity should balance.
When I worked in ICI’s hydrogen plant in the 1960s, ICI had no use for the hydrogen, so they sent it to their power station, blended it with coal gas and used it to make steam for other processes.
Could Keadby Next Generation power station be providing zero-carbon steam for the chemical and other processes on Humberside?
Adding the 910 MW of electricity to Keadby’s gas-fired total of 2.5 GW gives 3.4 GW of electricity from Keadby to back up the wind farms.
3.4 GW at Keadby is what I call backup!
It also should be noted, that one of the reasons for building the Mersey Tidal Barrage is to provide backup for all the wind farms in Liverpool Bay.
Conclusion
I believe that SSE could be supplying zero-carbon steam in addition to electricity from the Keadby Hydrogen power station.