The Boiling Frog: Didcot Power Station: The Final Countdown

Saturday, 26 July 2014

Didcot Power Station: The Final Countdown

With around 12 hours to go until three of Didcot Power Station's iconic cooling towers are demolished I took the opportunity this morning to take a last few pictures. As it turned out I wasn't the only one with the same idea, the area is currently teeming with photographers, both amateur and professional, though hampered slightly by some road restrictions that are already in place.

Talking to a number of 'sightseers' it appears that many have made the journey from all over the county for one last look. One theme is consistent, within Didcot and outside it, despite the undoubted joy by the likes Greenpeace, the overwhelming mood is one of frustration, disappointment and sadness. And not just because of the jobs lost in the process. There is no doubt where the blame lies.

So here are a selection of pictures taken this morning of Didcot power station's last stand:

3 comments:

john in cheshire26 July 2014 at 16:29
And they weren't doing anyone any harm. I've been in and around similar cooling-towers over the years and they are masterful in their simplicity and effectiveness. I wonder, once sanity is returned to our country if someone will have to build replacements, for the coal-powered stations that must inevitably, in my mind, be built.
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TheBoilingFrog26 July 2014 at 17:58
Agree about the simplicity of cooling towers - I had the privilege of being in one of them some years ago as part of a free tour around Didcot.

Not sure how long sanity will return, going by this website as an example it's going to take some time.

http://education.npower.com/web/science_technology_engineering_maths/power_station_visits/didcot_a/index.htm
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Anonymous27 July 2014 at 09:44
Sanity will return when the lights start going out.
Then they will return to sanity, after they have extorted a packet from everyone first, of course.

c777
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(Wim Duisenberg, first president of the EU Central Bank)

"Once the interlude of [WWI] was over, [countries] all went back to the rules and customs of traditional parliamentary democracies. I felt out of my depth."
(Jean Monnet 'Father of Europe')

"We need to build a United States of Europe with the [EU] Commission as government."
(Viviane Reding, EU Commissioner 2014)

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(Jean Monnet 'Father of Europe')

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(Tintin creator, Belgian born Herge)

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(Jean Monnet, 'Father of Europe')

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(Ted Heath)

Euro quotes

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(German MEP Markus Ferber 2010)

"The Euro has been a rock of stability... Joining the single currency would be a major step".
(Labour MEP, Richard Corbett, 2009)

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(Tony Blair 1998)

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(Adam Boulton Sunday Times, 2001)

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(Peter Mandelson, 2003)

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(Andrew Duff Lib Dem MEP 2011)

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The single currency is the greatest abandonment of sovereignty since the foundation of the European Community: the decision is of an essentially political nature".
(Felipe Gonzalez, a Spanish former PM, 1998)

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(European Council conclusions, 2001)

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(Then Greek Finance Minister, Yannis Papantoniou, 1999)

"The reality of the euro has exposed the absurdity of many anti-European scares while increasing the public thirst for information. Public opinion is already changing…as people can see the success of the new currency on the mainland".
(Kenneth Clarke MP, 2002)

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"I believe that, within the next twelve months, we will have averted contagion and stabilised the eurozone".
(German Finance Minister, Wolfgang Schäuble, 30 December 2011)

"We cannot be members of the single market without being part of the single currency, the euro...In life, fighting for a minority view is sometimes dangerous and painful. But when you know you are right, and when so much of our national prosperity depends on it, we should expect our political leaders to act".
(Virgin Group Chairman, Richard Branson, 2000)

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(WPP Group CEO, Sir Martin Sorrell, et al., 2003)

"A single currency, introduced at the appropriate time, will reduce costs for businesses that trade or invest across Europe...More investment in growing
businesses means more employment".
(Then BP Chairman, Lord David Simon, 1997)

"Joining the euro would increase our incomes and thus our standard of living...Now the countries of Europe have taken one more step towards making a truly unified market, using only one currency. If again we delay joining, we again risk falling further behind".
(Former Energy Secretary, Chris Huhne, former CBI Director General, Lord Adair Turner, et al., 2002)

"Staying out of the euro will mean progressive economic isolation for Britain. It will mean fewer foreign businesses investing here, fewer good jobs being created and less trade being done with our European partners".
(Former Business Secretary, Lord Peter Mandelson, 2003)

"Britain should join the euro within the next few years in order to enhance British power and influence".
(Centre for European Reform Director, Charles Grant, 2001)

"Joining EMU would offer multiple benefits...The euro would be good for jobs".
(Then TUC Secretary General, John Monks, 2003)

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(Former Labour Party leader, Neil Kinnock, 2002)

"The euro may well come to be regarded in the coming years as part of the answer to saving the City from permanent decline. It was easy to dismiss the fledgling euro as a ‘toilet currency’ before we realised our own economic growth was built on sand".
(Lib Dem leader, Nick Clegg, 2009)

"Obviously joining a currency that everybody in Europe - including soon all the new European Union members - are using, a currency that American and Japanese and overseas businesses understand, has to make sense".
(Then UK Europe Minister, Denis MacShane, 2003)

"The euro, despite gloomy predictions from anti-Europeans, has proved to be a success".
(Former Lib Dem leader, Charles Kennedy, 2002)

"In reality the economic integration between Britain and the Continent is so close, and we have confirmed this because we all belong to the common market, that it can't be good in the long run to stay out of such a cardinal element as the currency union".
(Then German Finance Minister, Hans Eichel, 2002)

"There are no real benefits and some real costs to the UK of monetary independence... it makes sense from a financial stability perspective for the UK to contract out monetary policy to the ECB".
(Citigroup Chief Economist, Willem Buiter, 2007)

"Taking part in EMU would improve policy and performance enough to eliminate many of the strains that sceptics predict would emerge without the safety valve of devaluation".
(BBC Trust Vice Chairman, Diane Coyle OBE, 1997)

"The euro is like a breastplate that will become more and more resistant. The stability of the currencies within its area is without question".
(Then EU Monetary Affairs Commissioner, Yves Thibault de Silguy, 1998)

"The strict rules attached to the euro could emerge as one of the best ways to persuade the markets that we will put Humpty Dumpty back together again, put the public finances in order".
(Lib Dem leader, Nick Clegg, 2009)

"The question of entering the euro is worth a lot more to Britain than the wild anti-federalist fantasies peddled by those who think Britain should have nothing to do with Europe. Nobody of any consequence in Europe wants to create a federal super-state".
(Former Business Secretary, Lord Peter Mandelson, 2003)

The British Government Knew The Consequences In 1971

Foreign and Commonwealth Office 30/1048 - 1971

...the transfer of major executive responsibilities to the bureaucratic Commission in Brussels will exacerbate popular feeling of alienation from government. To counter this feeling, strengthened local and regional democratic processes within the member states and effective Community regional economic and social policies will be essential.

Parliamentary sovereignty will be affected as we have seen. But the need for Parliament to play an increasing (if perhaps more specialised) role may develop. Firstly, although a European Parliament might in the longest term become an effective, directly elected democratic check upon the bureaucracy, this will not be for a long time, and certainly not in the decade to come. In the interval, to minimise the loss of democratic control it will be important that the British Parliamentarians should play an effective role both through the British membership in the European Parliament and through the processes of the British Parliament itself.

Test

Saturday, 26 July 2014

Didcot Power Station: The Final Countdown

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