Hypothetical Look at London after 3 days without power

[NorthernRaider]

[Skvez]

The hospitals and frozen food stores have back up power supplies as do SOME telephone exchanges, but the amount of fuel stored varies between 4 and 7 days worth

Most backup generators have a fuel tank with between 4 and 12 hours of fuel.
Hospitals and sewage works may have some additional storage but I'd be very surprised if any shops have additional fuel on hand.
Telephone companies are legally required to have sufficient back-up to keep the phones powered for 24 hours after loss of mains power (although these days lots of people have handsets (typically wireless)that require separate power rather than line power).
Most electrical outages in the UK are less than 4 hours and so that's what the plans take into consideration. Their idea of worst case is (after a few hours) close the shop, get the shoppers out in an orderly manner and assume it will all be fixed for tomorrow.

However short of an EMP I don't see a scanrio that would lead to an instant total 3 day+ loss of power in London.
Most SHTF scenarios would experience increasingly worse intermittent power.

[NorthernRaider]

However short of an EMP I don't see a scanrio that would lead to an instant total 3 day+ loss of power in London.
Most SHTF scenarios would experience increasingly worse intermittent power.

Russia shutting off the gas pipelines to europe as they did to the Uraine, The Islamic world refusing to sell us oil prefering to sell it to China and India, Civil unrest ala Greek style, Economic collapse, Terror attack on National grid, EMP, ICe storm like Canada in 84 which demolished most of the pylons, National strike by utilities workers ??

[bigpaul]

(quote) Nick Rosen wrote in 2007 in his book "How to live off grid": "Oil from the middle east and gas from Russia are both vital for our economy and both could simply be turned off in response to some British foreign policy"(unquote), on top of that this country only stores enough gas to last 13 DAYS.

[Skean Dhude]

It wasn't that long ago that Gordo annoyed the Russians. In that case they responded by kicking Brits out of Russia. Next time it may be gas restrictions and if we are on wind turbine power at the time it could easy be No power.

[bigpaul]

"here we go, lets have a crack at wind turbines while were at it!" the wind industry is in its infancy, we havent got many wind turbines but we have to start somewhere, if the power goes off with wind power you would have SOME power not much i grant you but some is better than nothing, better than having another Chernobyl. can someone tell me if the SHTF and the power goes off, what happens to nuclear power, do the reactors just shut down or do they go into meltdown and explode??

[Skvez]

Northern Raider those are good reasons for the UK to be unable to provide 100% power but they wouldn't result in total loss of supply.
The UK would have to instigate rolling blackouts but everywhere would have power for at least some time every day.
My point stands that a 100% to 0% instant loss of supply is very unlikely.

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BigPaul
Older Nuclear power designs require power to cycle the coolant water, without it we run the risk of Japan-type problems.
A Chernoble type explosion should not happen with the UK Nuclear designs.

[Skean Dhude]

"here we go, lets have a crack at wind turbines while were at it!"

Not a crack. More of a fissure.

I think wind turbines are crap and will lead us into disaster. They are OK for individuals and should be located on their houses. I will have one myself but for a community use they are next to useless. We have working technology why waste time and money working on something that looks like it may never work.

It may work eventually but is that before or after we have brownouts all over the UK. I'm betting on the brownouts.

[Skvez]

Skean,
Wind turbines should not be mounted to houses (I really must finish my wind turbine article!)

Wind turbines are not the full answer but they are part of the answer in a well balanced electricy supply program for the UK.

[Skean Dhude]

Skvez,

You did mention that bit as I remember reading it.

I stand corrected. I meant in their own property as a supply for themselves only and to reduce their reliance on the grid. If wired up correctly of course.