Coal is coming back to replace gas
March 26, 2008 at 2:22 am
The now infamous sight of those towering brick chimneys that pump thick black fumes into our British skyline from the burning of coal and other fossil fuels, feels like a thing of the past in today’s world of environmental concern. The thousands of redundant coal miners will tell you how much this country needs its coal. However, the man in charge of energy in the government, John Hutton, has said this month that in order for the UK to avoid drastic power cuts we need to look back to coal as a source of energy.
It’s come as quite a surprise to many and quite something else to the many environmental campaigners, who thought they’d seen the back of the black-stuff. But Mr Hutton defends new ‘clean coal’ as being much more environmentally friendly and a much more effective source of energy for us Brits.
The massive energy company E.ON wants to start digging for the special coal in the North Sea and then see to it that the first coal-powered power station for nearly 25 years is built on a site in Kent (the so called garden of England). E.ON claims the new coal would cut carbon emissions by 2 million tonnes a year but its critics aren’t convinced at the tests already carried out on the coal and whether the figures are just a smoke-screen… so to speak.
Some might argue that Mr Hutton adopts a somewhat lacklustre approach to the environmental cause when he says that the UK will be meeting the international obligations for pollution. He feels that we can’t turn our backs on fossil fuels entirely. Is it enough, though, just to meet a quota or should the UK be doing more?
British Gas makes more moves to India
March 13, 2008 at 2:22 am
Despite having the worst customer services record in the energy market – receiving more complaints per 100,000 customers in the last year – British Gas still think it’s a good idea to make hundreds of members of staff in the UK redundant and continue to move their customer services call-centres to India. They seem to have adopted a series of somewhat muddled strategies of late and none was more confusing than when some staff faced the chop whilst others were taken on a luxurious holiday to Tenerife.
Nothing seems to be wrong with the profit margins at British Gas. They were proud to announce that they made a whopping £571 million profit from residential business last year and even had the cheek to increase their prices after this by around 15% at the start of 2008.
A British Gas spokesman backs up the action by saying that they are making efforts to cut costs, which includes making redundancies. The regulator for the energy market Ofgem is currently ensconced in a thorough investigation of the main energy supply companies and this will mean taking a good look at British Gas and seeing what they are actually doing under the surface.
There are now up to 1000 members of staff working on the phones for British Gas in Bombay and Poona and they have been tasked with dealing with the most concerned customers, such as those who are inheriting bills from a deceased relative and those finding it tough to pay their bills. Is this good or bad customer service?
