The Dark Truth About Net Zero
3 Things I Learned + Bonus Video
This week I spoke with Kathryn Porter, an energy economist who has received two death threats for saying things the government would rather people didn’t hear. She has a physics degree, she has worked inside the industry, and she is one of the very few people in Britain who has actually read the data rather than just repeated the official line.
Three things I learned:
1. Thousands of people are dying every year because they can’t afford to heat their homes. The ONS was publishing figures of 6,000 to 8,000 deaths annually from fuel poverty until around 2023, when they stopped. Kathryn thinks the real number is higher now.
2. Scotland’s electricity grid is heading for collapse and almost nobody is talking about it. The two power stations Scotland depends on are both approaching the end of their lives, replacements take seven to eight years to build, and the government’s plan for filling the gap has never been attempted anywhere in the world.
3. The “independent” report that the government uses to justify its Clean Power 2030 target was not independent. Freedom of Information requests confirmed that ministers signed off on the content before it was published. The man in charge has been telling Parliament it shows the target is achievable. Kathryn says that is not what it says.
Watch the bonus part below.
Watch the full interview on:
Paid subscribers also got to put their questions directly to Kathryn. She told us which country she thinks has the most sensible energy policy in the world right now (the answer might surprise you), why she thinks veganism would be a miserable and counterproductive response to the climate crisis, and what she really thinks is driving celebrity activists like Greta Thunberg.
If you want in on those conversations, the link to subscribe is below.
