Energy gap? The UK’s use has actually fallen | Letters

"Engineers warn of looming UK energy gap" (26 January). That is, unless we build masses more power stations. Really? In the past 10 years, overall energy use has already fallen by 18%. Just in the past year, even while GDP grew by 2.8%, energy sales fell by 6.6%. Over the past 50 years, while we have practically tripled our wealth, overall energy usage has fallen, from 196.8 to 187.9 million tonnes of oil equivalent. All this has occurred without any sustained drive to reduce consumption levels. Just think what we could achieve were to take a leaf out of the German or Nordic books, and really push energy efficiency programmes. Power gap? What power gap?
Andrew Warren
Chairman, British Energy Efficiency Federation

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