Do you think we will have electricity/gas rationing this winter?

[lonelyapple]

Apparently the Government have assessed a "reasonable worst case scenario" which would involve rationing electricity to 6 million homes this winter if Russia cuts off further gas supplies to Europe.

www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/power-cuts-energy-bills-russia-b2090163.html

What a lovely dystopian present we are living in :(.

YANBU = Yes, there will be power cuts/utility rationing.
YABU = Nope, it won't happen, the Tories are excellent at planning for such contingencies (joke).

Sorry, I was a bit snappy

That's OK, I didn't phrase it very clearly.

In the U.K. are private pools on a separate circuit?

Sadly I'm nowhere near rich enough to have one, so I don't know! But when water has been rationed, specific activities (usually hosepipes) are banned even though there are no separate water outlets in homes, and it relies on people choosing to comply or (possibly) neighbours reporting breaches. As you say, if overall use was limited based on the average consumption for the household size, that would effectively prevent it. There'd have to be exceptions for people who used power-hungry medical equipment or similar.

I have solar power and it's of little use in the winter , it only works when the sun is on it. Just working on the paltry feed in tariff payments I get over the winter .

The important words in that article are "could" and "if". Not worth worrying about at the moment.

Yes. The same scenario as we face now (except Ukraine /Russia) played out in the 70s. We had rationing, called planned power cuts then. The local fair ran their generators to power ships etc.
I hated it then, it was really hard work just getting through one day after another through winter and I hate the thought that we’ve learnt sod all from it nearly 50 years later. Plus people are much less self reliant and resilient than they we were back then.
Short of some miracle, this coming year is not going to be at all easy for far too many.

I suspect they probably will. I just about remember power outages, being sat in candlelight. I'm wondering how to keep a house warm which is solely powered by electricity - I'm not that fussed about sitting in the dark.

Just speculating but if they did ration it overnight as a PP has suggested, it would presumably mean everyone charged devices and so on during the day - probably at peak rate.

Daytime power cuts would certainly limit working from home! And that would affect a LOT of people.

I can't see it happening to be honest but sure, better to have a plan than not.

can't see the 1% abiding

There are codes and regulations for gas and energy rationing, I believe it’s done by post codes but energy intensive industries will be hit first. It’s scare tactics to think that people will be forced to go without power and heating in their homes.

But yes. Some form of rationing has been discussed for a while now in the industry.

It was the 70s, and it was 3-6 hours at a time. The times/areas were known in advance. We got sent home from work early or started late on power cut days.

Of course, that was before offices were so dependent on IT (we had a typing pool and most of the typewriters were manual), so all the while it was light enough we could carry on working. And many homes still had open fires or gas fires, so they could still keep warm.

I was sharing a flat with my boyfriend and another friend. We had a gas cooker, a gas multipoint for hot water and a gas fire in the living room, so we were warm and could have baths and hot food. I have quite fond memories of spending the evenings playing cards and board games by candlelight during power cuts. And I learned to play bridge during those dark evenings!

If it's turned off, it's turned off. Abiding doesn't come into it.

@Antarcticant me either. In fact I'm staying in my flat now instead of buying a house, let alone one with a pool 🤣🤣

I think water rationing/hose pipe bans are a bit easier to control through reporting & 'useage'. Harder to snitch on a neighbour heating their pool, the only evidence really is 'but sir, they're using it sir & they've not turned blue!!'

They won't turn it off for too long at a time because of food spoilage, it will likely be a timetable of a few hours each evening like in the 70s. I shall make sure the caravan battery is charged up and gas full and go in there as the central heating won't work.

The government has said it won't happen so, yes, it probably will.

It wouldn't be rationed they would just turn it off. Planned times and days. I am not sure why people think this is a scare tactic! It's a real possibility. And what Russia will probably resort to. Blackmailing the west with fuel cuts so we agree to favourable ceasefire terms in the Ukraine. It doesn't matter where our gas currently comes from we will not be immune to shortages. Just thinking 'it will never come to that' is why the west's energy stratgey is so crap!
And as someone else said gas heating etc is useless without electricity. I will certainly be ensuring I have candles, torch batteries and gas for my camping stove. It's going to be a real wake up call imo.

We have a camping battery and stove, will be keeping the battery charged. It has been a real possibility for a while but there are regulations already in place if it has to happen. DH works in electricity policies/regulations so we’ve known for a while that this could happen.

My husband needs medical equipment at night so i wprry about this, i like to think they would take this into account but this government havent shown thenseleves to care about disabilities that much

In the evening would be rubbish but we would have to cope i guess

It's a bit of a loaded question with the obvious anti tory slant, but no there won't be rationing, and as you have introduced an anti tory slant. What would change if another party got into power wrt the energy crisis, do you think a couple more wind turbines can just be thrown up in a couple of months to solve the issue?

The dystopian future started at the start of lockdown when there was a lot of people saying that the money would have to be paid back hence why inflation is rappent across the world, if you lack critical thinking you can squint and still try and blame the tories (which you are kind of trying to imply) but if there was energy rationing going on then it would effect the rest of the eu/world so would have to jump through mental hoops to put it on the current gov in power.

Didn't the government annonce a couple of months ago that we didn't need to worry about our energy supplies?

I do suspect many will be rationing use themselves in an effort to keep their bills down.

There go the Christmas light displays on houses round our way! I never know how some people can afford to run them for weeks on end. They do bring cheer but this year maybe not so much. Sorry for using the c word in May

The energy-intensive industry I work in is currently testing its contingency plans in case their gas is shut off. They would limit non-essential industry before they let people freeze in their houses, and there is a lot of gas to share around from some of these places. They couldn’t be closed forever as we do need them and it would impact the economy too much, but they could close in the short term (or run on alternative power) without too much trouble.

The current feeling is let’s have a contingency in place just in case, but it’s unlikely we’ll have to use it.

how do you prepare for this? my whole life is run on electricity. my cooker is electric, how would we cook?

Dh works in the industry and he’s said for years if people knew how close we are most winters to blackouts they’d be scared. And this was before Ukraine and current rising costs, etc.

so I imagine this year it’s a real possibility. Glad I’ve got a stove, at least we can keep one room warm.

There are plans afoot to keep coal fired power stations open, which is an indication that the UK government is finally seeing the folly of the situation they've created.

Britain could keep coal-fired power plants open this winter

Constructing huge numbers of wind turbines that produce nothing when the wind doesn't blow was always a stupid plan. I can only assume it was pursued for reasons of crony capitalism, because it makes zero sense from a science and engineering perspective.

We used to be all electric in the 70s. We had an open fire - I learnt to cook meals on that and heat up water for washing. Laundry was done in cold water and lot less often than today. In the summer a small camping gas stove was used instead of the fire. Cars were not used as much. One journey for everything or you walked or biked. Thought nothing of walking 10 miles to the shop and back. Nothing new, it was all hand me downs. No after school clubs except brownies, because that gave parents one hour a week to talk to each other. Chilblains and pneumonia were very common. Ice on the inside of windows and frozen cold water tanks the norm.

Never a truer word spoken!

what if you don't even have a fireplace?
and we already don't drive and don't put the heating on (we only storage heater in the living room and it cost too much to run anyway)

I'm worried more about cooking, sandwiches are great but we use cooking to keep warm in winter, sit next to the open oven after dinner. no oven, no warm food, no warm room.