Mike Foster

Norway are drilling the same North Sea, and started doing so several years before the UK. Why do people think the UK is part is dead while Norway keep finding more? The only difference is incentives.

Good grief. As I’ve long suspected, Labour will block growth from AI because of their ideological commitment to Net Zero targets. If AI companies pay for their own energy, why would Government block them starting up in Britain? It won’t save the planet - those companies will still start somewhere - it will just leave Britain behind a technological curve leaving us poorer, weaker and with fewer opportunities for our children. Energy policy should serve the needs of the public, not some fanatical bean-counters in Government who care more about domestic emissions targets than growth or global emissions. Two years ago, when I was Energy Secretary, I spoke about the dangerous myth within Government that said we would need less energy going forward, I said we would need MORE reliable 24/7 energy supply because of AI. That meant more gas and a lot more nuclear. Yet just a few months ago Chris Stark, Ed Miliband’s head of his Clean Power mission said the growth in AI had come as a surprise to him, saying ‘I wish I had a crystal ball two years ago’. If I knew it then, he should have too. I’ve been asking Ed if he would block data centres that pay for their own energy supply on the grounds of Net Zero targets. He dodges the question every time because he knows he has NO MANDATE to block growth because of net zero. We need energy realism. There is a global race for energy happening because of AI, we are the only country shutting down our own supplies in the North Sea and pursuing short term unfeasible targets for an almost purely renewable system over the need for cheap, abundant energy. This is economic suicide. It won’t save the planet if those data centres are built in Europe, or the US or China but not in Britain. It will just leave us poorer. Our children deserve better. We need to make electricity cheap.

Ed’s wind and solar dash means building a lot more grid (up to 3 times as much). At worst we’ll have blackouts, but in all cases consumers are set to pay BILLIONS more to switch wind and solar farms off because the grid won’t be able to cope. All of that cost goes on bills.