2012-10-29

Smash the dash for gas!

Intrepid climber Ewa Jasiewicz is at the top of a chimney in a new gas-fired power station and wants us to know why:

The government and the big energy companies want to build as many as 20 new gas power stations, which would leave the UK dependent on this highly polluting and increasingly expensive fuel for decades to come.
[...]
We already rely on gas for 83% of our central heating and almost 50% of electricity. Increasing this dependence will cause household energy bills to rise even further, pushing those who live the most precarious lives deeper into fuel poverty.
Oh, well that's all right then. So gas is expensive, and if we stop the UK building more gas plants then we'll stop bills from rising because nuclear, solar and wind are so much cheaper, and coal is less polluting, than gas.

We ask ourselves: who is Ewa Jasiewicz and what does she want? Ewa's previous Guardian writings give us a clue:

  • Ewa Jasiewicz spends a harrowing week in Gaza documenting life under attack;
  • Primark answered critics over its use of child labour by closing factories in India. But its PR worries aren't over yet;
  • Don't exclude those of us who want to see revolutionary change from the fight against global warming. We're all in this together;
  • There can be no state solutions to climate change: governments won't give up the powers that leads to environmental ruin; and
  • To the fury of ordinary Iraqis, the country's oilfields are being privatised. Unions must fight together to prevent it.
She's writing and video-ing all over the shop; back in July, for instance, she was telling Sainsbury's to pay a "living wage". I couldn't quite find the time to watch her speech on the united4justice YouTube channel. I think you get the picture. Find a trendy cause and you find Ms. Jasiewicz. She and her pals in Kampania Palestyna outdid themselves in 2010 by scrawling graffiti on the Warsaw Ghetto Monument saying "Free Gaza and Palestine":
"People here need to wake up and realise that occupations and ghettos did not end with the end of the second world war. These tactics and strategies of domination and control of other people and lands are present in Palestine today and are being perpetrated by the state of Israel. We have a responsibility to free all ghettos and end all occupations".
Way to win over the Polish Jewish vote, Ewa!

Without wishing to be uncharitable, I note that West Burton is forecast to have rain all week, and night-time temperatures (at ground level) hovering just above freezing. Personally I'd fence around the base of the chimney to prevent delivery of any additional clothing, food, or fuel, and leave Ms. Jasiewicz up there as long as she wants to stay.

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