Fraser Nelson

The scale of Brown's broken economy

Two analyses of the economy today, one fanciful and one spot-on. Gordon Brown says

“I am confident that we can get through these difficult times and meet these challenges a stronger, more secure and fairer country then ever before.”

Why is he confident? The cure for this will require the precise opposite to his policies – and this is what he shows no sign of beginning to grasp. The UK economy has buckled under the weight of the debt Brown has rung up. The speech of recovery will be dictated by how debt-burdened...

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Freddie and Fannie

The ‘conservatorship’ of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae represents, as Steven Pearlstein notes in the Washington Post, the most direct role for the federal government in the “workings of the financial system” since the great depression. Clive Crook points out that the eventual nationalisation of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae will bring 25 more times more loans onto the public balance sheet than the nationalisation of Northern Rock did in Britain. It is an illustration of how bad things are that there has been almost no political dissent about the move.

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Tim Worstall

Tidal Energy

An interesting little piece about a new form of tidal electricity generation.

Harnessing the vast energy of the UK's coastal tides could become much simpler and cheaper with a new design for the next generation of underwater turbines.

Leaving aside the technical details (essentially, put it the other way around, vertical not horizontal, as can be done with certain windmill designs) this is good news. Cheaper to build, cheaper to maintain than current designs. All good stuff.

However, this isn't a good argument for immediately investing in installing renewables. In fact, it's an excellent argument for not installing yet.

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Tim Worstall

Mindboggling

I'm at the UKIP party conference today and just by chance this story turns up in the Register.

A former chief scientific advisor to the government has said that EU renewable-energy quotas will cause widespread fuel poverty. Sir David King believes that European heads of state, in agreeing the targets, may have mistaken electricity usage for total energy consumption - leading to overly ambitious and expensive goals being set.

The question is, how did we end up with a target of 20% of all energy from renewables? Given that almost all renewable generation methods, as well as being horrendously...

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