Cold turkey at Christmas?

But an energy expert and government advisor says there's a good chance our lights will go out over Christmas. Nick Morrison reports.

IF you remember the early 1970s, chances are you remember more than one evening spent by candlelight. Toasting bread over an open fire; digging out the battery-operated radio; using a candle to find your way to the bathroom - it was possible to make being in the dark into an awfully big adventure.

But, like Cinzano and Arctic Roll, power cuts were very much a phenomenon of the 1970s, a time of three-day weeks and oil shortages. We may still be plunged into darkness by the odd blown fuse or lines brought down by winds, but no longer do we have to light our way to bed like Wee Willie Winkie.

Or so we thought. We may have believed, eating our microwaved meals in our centrally-heated homes, that we were insulated from such primitive conditions. But now it seems we may have spoken a little too soon.

This summer, the United States suffered the worst blackout in its history, as 50 million people on its Eastern Seaboard lost all power for several days, costing an economy just emerging from recession many billions of dollars.

Britain's Energy Minister Stephen Timms scarcely had time to say it couldn't happen here, when it did. Hundreds of thousands of commuters were trapped in tunnels as the London Underground came to a halt, with much of south London without electricity for an hour.

National Grid Transco said the London blackout was the result of an "exceptional" combination of circumstances which is unlikely to be repeated. But others are less complacent.

Even before the lights went out over London, Professor Ian Fells of Newcastle University, a government energy advisor and one of the most respected men in his field, warned similar power cuts to those which blacked out the US could strike Britain. This is most likely to happen when there is an exceptionally high demand for electricity. Perhaps when a lot of ovens have been turned on to cook turkey.

Prof Fells reckons there is a one in 20 chance of power cuts this Christmas. That seems like quite a good prospect of Britain going cold turkey. There are two problems, he says. One is that there isn't enough slack in the system to allow for some generators going down, hit by technical failure or the vagaries of the weather. In the longer term, we are simply not building enough power stations to replace those that are reaching the end of their useful lives.

"There is a shortage of spare electricity generating capacity," he says. "We used to have about 28 per cent spare capacity, and that is what we need, so that when we get very cold weather, or there is a breakdown, or things go wrong, such as a storm which can disrupt part of the distribution system, you have some spare.

"Since privatisation, and particularly since new trading arrangements were brought in two years ago, that spare capacity has been cut back and cut back. Sometimes it has sunk as low as eight per cent. Provided everything works, that is ok, but as soon as things go wrong then you have to call on spare capacity.

"If there is a prolonged cold spell, they might not be able to guarantee supplies, that is the top and bottom of it."

While the breakdowns over the summer have been more to do with the distribution system than a lack of supply, he says years of under-investment have brought us to the point where only a small number of mishaps could have catastrophic effects. And while there are spare power stations which could be used, it is expensive to bring them out of mothballs.

An added complication is that two years ago the Government stopped paying electricity companies to produce spare capacity, on the grounds this was inefficient. "If the capacity payments were reinstated, it would give them some enthusiasm for un-mothballing power stations," he says.

Without such an incentive, electricity companies are, quite reasonably, interested in making a profit. The occasional power cut may be just too bad.

"What makes matters worse is that over the next five or six years, ten or so power stations will be decommissioned, some of the nuclear stations and some of the coal stations," adds Prof Fells. "The question is, what is going to replace them?

"We will have to spend a lot of money building new power stations, but at the moment no one is enthusiastic about putting money into power stations. There is a danger of power cuts this year, but there will be a bigger danger in 2005 and 2006."

Our electricity system came under intense pressure on December 10 last year, with a record surge in demand and the breakdown of some power stations. Supplies were maintained, but it was a close-run thing.

But the electricity industry itself is confident there will be no interruptions in supply. A spokesman for National Grid Transco admitted that spare capacity in the system had fallen as low as 16.5 per cent in the summer, but said it was now standing at 20.1 per cent, considered adequate to meet most eventualities.

"There is very little chance of cuts this winter due to lack of capacity. Last winter, there was one particular day when we had lots of generators fall off the system and that was one of the coldest days, and we didn't have any power cuts.

"We never say never, but we're confident that we can keep a light on over the winter."

Ofgem, which regulates the electricity market and was responsible to ending the spare capacity payments, reckons a 20 per cent margin is sufficient.

A spokesman says: "There are no guarantees we can make that there are not going to be any power cuts, but we do think the capacity is safe and we don't forecast any blackouts over Christmas. We do think Ian Fells is scaremongering."

Prof Fells, for his part, says that Ofgem is too complacent, and its confidence in the market to sort it all out is misplaced. In the meantime, three of his four sons have bought themselves generators to make sure they still have power if the lights go out. "We might have a nice mild winter and it will be alright, but they're not daft," he adds.