Blackout fear as UK power plants face axe

A tenth of the UK’s power plants could be forced to close by the spring of 2013 – two-and-a-half years ahead of schedule, new research shows.

The revelation will stoke fresh concern that the government has not done enough to head off a looming energy generation gap that could lead to blackouts across the country.
Under an EU directive, companies operating old coal and oil-fired plants were given the option to spend hundreds of millions of pounds to upgrade them to comply with tougher pollution standards.

Those that “opted out” of the programme – nine plants representing about 15% of UK power supply – were given 20,000 hours to operate, starting from January last year through to the end of 2015. Based on research from the energy-consultancy group Utilyx, several of these plants have been running at historically high rates that would put them out of commission much sooner than originally thought.

The Sunday Times