0:00:03 > 0:00:06'The first pylon of Britain's National Electricity Grid
0:00:06 > 0:00:09'went up in 1928.
0:00:09 > 0:00:11'And we've been plugging in ever since.
0:00:13 > 0:00:19'Today, the National Grid forms the very veins and arteries of our nation.'
0:00:20 > 0:00:24If you lose your electricity, you're pretty much dead in the water.
0:00:25 > 0:00:29'Competition for the power to feed our grid has been fierce.'
0:00:29 > 0:00:33Nuclear energy was a glamorous industry, unlike coal.
0:00:33 > 0:00:39We are going to show that you can produce electrical energy from windmills.
0:00:39 > 0:00:43'And the grid itself has been the battleground for conflicts
0:00:43 > 0:00:46'that have changed and shaped our nation.'
0:00:46 > 0:00:50Stop the electricity and they've got to go to the negotiating table.
0:00:51 > 0:00:54'We've fallen in love with power.
0:00:54 > 0:00:57'But what price are we ultimately prepared to pay for it?'
0:01:01 > 0:01:03The primary concern was to keep lights on.
0:01:24 > 0:01:30'By the end of the 1960s, Britain was using more electricity than ever.'
0:01:32 > 0:01:36The average home, even then, had more horsepower inside it
0:01:36 > 0:01:40than the average factory had had in 1900.
0:01:41 > 0:01:45The first significant electrical item I bought was a washing machine.
0:01:45 > 0:01:50If I see something, yeah, I would maybe go to town on it.
0:01:51 > 0:01:56'Power is to an industrial nation what blood is to the body.'
0:01:58 > 0:02:02'Now life without power had become the stuff of nightmares.'
0:02:03 > 0:02:06It would be a disaster almost impossible to contemplate.
0:02:06 > 0:02:10There'd be no transport. There'd be no radio or television
0:02:10 > 0:02:13or newspapers or telephones or postal service.
0:02:13 > 0:02:16Within a little while, food would start to rot unharvested in the ground
0:02:16 > 0:02:20and unfrozen and uncanned in the store houses.
0:02:21 > 0:02:25'Then, on 7th December 1970,
0:02:25 > 0:02:28'our bad dreams came true.'
0:02:28 > 0:02:30I was, at that time, group manager
0:02:30 > 0:02:33responsible for five power stations in the Midlands.
0:02:33 > 0:02:37And I was telephoned at two o'clock on the Monday morning
0:02:37 > 0:02:42and we had a very serious and dramatic emergency before we knew what was happening, really.
0:02:44 > 0:02:49'A wage dispute in power stations had led to the men calling a ban on overtime.'
0:02:49 > 0:02:52What are you actually doing when you work to rule?
0:02:52 > 0:02:57Well, when you work to rule, you do your own job, which you're entitled to do. Nothing else.
0:02:57 > 0:03:00- Does it make that much difference? - A hell of a difference.
0:03:01 > 0:03:06The industrial staff hadn't had any industrial action for a very long time,
0:03:06 > 0:03:09so that was rather a surprise to us.
0:03:11 > 0:03:15How long do you think it would take for this effect to be felt?
0:03:15 > 0:03:19I should've thought that it would take some three weeks to a month
0:03:19 > 0:03:22before there is a serious breakdown
0:03:22 > 0:03:28in the supply of electricity in general.
0:03:29 > 0:03:33'In fact, it took just eight hours.'
0:03:33 > 0:03:38The lights went out about quarter to eight yesterday morning
0:03:38 > 0:03:42and they came on again just for an hour between 10 and 11 o'clock
0:03:42 > 0:03:45and they didn't come on again till this morning at 20 to ten.
0:03:46 > 0:03:50A sudden power cut destroys the modern world instantly.
0:03:52 > 0:03:56All these humming, whirring machines stop,
0:03:56 > 0:04:00the lights go out and you're plunged into a primeval darkness.
0:04:00 > 0:04:02The things that go bump in the night come out again
0:04:02 > 0:04:07having vanished for many decades and you're back in a medieval world just like that.
0:04:09 > 0:04:14'No-one's exempt. Buckingham Palace has been in the dark for most of the afternoon.'
0:04:14 > 0:04:17'Christmas illuminations have been switched off to conserve power.'
0:04:17 > 0:04:22'In Coventry, 15,000 workers have been affected at Jaguar Cars.'
0:04:22 > 0:04:24'Traffic lights went out at the peak of the rush hour.
0:04:24 > 0:04:28'At Bilston, a woman died after she was knocked down at lights that had failed.'
0:04:28 > 0:04:33What the power workers' dispute in 1970 demonstrated for the first time
0:04:33 > 0:04:38was just how dependent the country was on centralised electricity generation.
0:04:38 > 0:04:42You affect the supply of the electricity into the grid,
0:04:42 > 0:04:45the grid destabilises, you affect the entire country.
0:04:47 > 0:04:50"The council regret to inform you
0:04:50 > 0:04:54"that this area will probably have a power cut today
0:04:54 > 0:04:58"from 11am to 3pm."
0:05:01 > 0:05:06'Four days into the emergency, the army was mobilised
0:05:06 > 0:05:10'to send back-up generators to hospitals in crisis.'
0:05:10 > 0:05:13We were resuscitating a critically ill patient
0:05:13 > 0:05:17who had had a serious, major operation the evening before,
0:05:17 > 0:05:21and whose condition had been as critical as can be in a person of this age,
0:05:21 > 0:05:28when all of a sudden the lights were cut and we were thrown into a great degree of confusion.
0:05:29 > 0:05:33'The conduct of even the most routine procedures was in disarray.'
0:05:41 > 0:05:45I was ten years old at the time of the power cuts in 1970.
0:05:45 > 0:05:48My doctor decided it was time for me to have my tonsils out.
0:05:48 > 0:05:51So, consequently, I'd gone into hospital
0:05:51 > 0:05:55and then, basically, there was about 20 of us on the children's ward.
0:05:55 > 0:05:58I think most of us were there to have our tonsils out.
0:05:59 > 0:06:02It was like, all the time you were just kind of,
0:06:02 > 0:06:05"Is it going to be my turn today? Are they going to have...
0:06:05 > 0:06:08"Is the power going to be on for long enough?"
0:06:10 > 0:06:15The staff installed lanterns and candles around the ward
0:06:15 > 0:06:18and they kind of turned it into a bit of an adventure, if you like.
0:06:18 > 0:06:20The nurses used to tell us ghost stories.
0:06:20 > 0:06:23They'd tell us about people who'd died in the hospital
0:06:23 > 0:06:27and their ghosts still walked the corridors, this kind of thing.
0:06:28 > 0:06:34Are you surprised how seriously the work to rule has affected electricity supplies?
0:06:34 > 0:06:39We're all a bit surprised at the speed with which the overtime ban and work to rule has bitten.
0:06:41 > 0:06:48The general public were very angry. Some people would not serve electricity supply workers in shops.
0:06:48 > 0:06:51One of my power stations was Leicester Power Station
0:06:51 > 0:06:56and I remember looking at the gate, waiting for the Ladies of Leicester Town.
0:06:56 > 0:07:00The housewives had decided they were going to march on the power station.
0:07:00 > 0:07:03It was surprising to the trade unions
0:07:03 > 0:07:05and they discovered that they couldn't control it.
0:07:05 > 0:07:10And they were as highly motivated as the management of the industry
0:07:10 > 0:07:13to get this problem resolved.
0:07:14 > 0:07:17'When even the Houses of Parliament lost power
0:07:17 > 0:07:19'and needed an emergency generator,
0:07:19 > 0:07:22'both sides knew it was time to settle.
0:07:24 > 0:07:29'Only a week after the dispute started, the lights were back on.'
0:07:31 > 0:07:32You're back on the ward now.
0:07:32 > 0:07:36It was about three or four days before I finally got the operation
0:07:36 > 0:07:40and then when I did have it, I found they had no ice cream
0:07:40 > 0:07:42cos the freezers hadn't been running.
0:07:42 > 0:07:45And that was the big disappointment, to be honest!
0:07:48 > 0:07:51Has it all been worthwhile, Mr Chapple?
0:07:51 > 0:07:55Well, that's very difficult to say.
0:07:55 > 0:07:58I think we all understand a bit more clearly
0:07:58 > 0:08:02what's at stake when an action of this sort is embarked upon.
0:08:03 > 0:08:05The real seats of power in Britain,
0:08:05 > 0:08:09while we might think of them as the House of Commons, Parliament,
0:08:09 > 0:08:16but actually, we need electric power, the power stations are the real seat of contemporary power.
0:08:17 > 0:08:24'And in 1971, three quarters of our power stations relied on one fuel.
0:08:24 > 0:08:26'British coal was king.'
0:08:26 > 0:08:30There was a great awareness on the part of ministers, the press
0:08:30 > 0:08:34and the public, that the electricity grid depended
0:08:34 > 0:08:36very substantially on coal.
0:08:36 > 0:08:41Everybody was aware of that. And, of course, so were the miners.
0:08:41 > 0:08:45And that is what gave them, as it were, the handle.
0:08:48 > 0:08:51The grid produced electricity for the factories.
0:08:51 > 0:08:54It was the key industry, but they needed the coal.
0:08:54 > 0:08:58They needed the coal to produce the steam to drive the generators.
0:08:58 > 0:09:01That was hellish power, that. Hellish power.
0:09:02 > 0:09:07There's no question in my mind that the miners learned from the power dispute in 1970.
0:09:07 > 0:09:10So whereas at one time, a coal industry dispute, a miners' strike,
0:09:10 > 0:09:13might have very serious local consequences,
0:09:13 > 0:09:17only very, very rarely did it have national consequences.
0:09:17 > 0:09:23The possibility now was that a miners' strike could have major national consequences
0:09:23 > 0:09:27through destabilising the grid by denying it coal.
0:09:31 > 0:09:35'After a decade of watching their wages fall behind other workforces,
0:09:35 > 0:09:38'Britain's miners had had enough
0:09:38 > 0:09:40'and they had the stomach for a bloody battle.
0:09:42 > 0:09:48'In January 1972, all 280,000 of them came out on strike.
0:09:49 > 0:09:51'But numbers alone weren't going to be enough.
0:09:51 > 0:09:55'For maximum impact on the grid, they needed a strategy.'
0:09:55 > 0:09:59Are you suggesting there might be picket lines round power stations?
0:09:59 > 0:10:03Well, I'm saying there'll be picket lines around anywhere
0:10:03 > 0:10:07if it'll contribute towards the success of the exercise we're involved in.
0:10:09 > 0:10:12'Every morning at 8:30, the miners signed on for picket duty.'
0:10:15 > 0:10:18'Their aim was to move out and follow the course of the coal,
0:10:18 > 0:10:22'and that led them straight to the giant power stations of the Trent Valley.'
0:10:22 > 0:10:26The main target was actually the power stations.
0:10:27 > 0:10:32And it did need a very high level of intelligence and organisation on the part of the NUM.
0:10:32 > 0:10:38And this was an innovation in the conduct of industrial relations in this country.
0:10:38 > 0:10:41Previously, they'd basically sat around the collieries.
0:10:41 > 0:10:45Now they were moving out to stop the use of coal.
0:10:45 > 0:10:50And so one of the key developments that the NUM came up with in this period
0:10:50 > 0:10:52was what became known as flying pickets.
0:10:55 > 0:10:59You'd probably get a knock on the door. "Have your bag ready for six o'clock, we're away."
0:10:59 > 0:11:03My wife used to pack a bag for us and ensured us plenty of warm clothes
0:11:03 > 0:11:09because January, February time, it was cold. And it was cold.
0:11:10 > 0:11:15We didn't know where we were going, where we were sleeping, we didn't know anything.
0:11:15 > 0:11:17It was completely unknown.
0:11:20 > 0:11:26'The miners' aim was to stop anything getting through power station gates.'
0:11:27 > 0:11:32The NUM has always been extremely well organised, so it wasn't too difficult for them to do that.
0:11:32 > 0:11:35They had these tight-knit local communities
0:11:35 > 0:11:41and local NUM branches, and when Father says jump, they all jump.
0:11:43 > 0:11:46SHOUTING
0:11:46 > 0:11:49That's what we had to do.
0:11:51 > 0:11:54We were desperate. They were desperate.
0:11:54 > 0:11:59It was a question of who was the most desperate.
0:12:04 > 0:12:09I was station manager at Rugeley Power Station.
0:12:09 > 0:12:13I think we developed a siege mentality.
0:12:13 > 0:12:17They had a small tent arranged.
0:12:17 > 0:12:23We did some surveillance and found that they slept there during the night.
0:12:23 > 0:12:31So we arranged that our tankers arrived about four o'clock in the morning. They came straight through.
0:12:31 > 0:12:34I don't believe that. I don't believe it.
0:12:34 > 0:12:36The pickets were still asleep.
0:12:36 > 0:12:39If they fell asleep with a wagon, they must've been dead.
0:12:39 > 0:12:44They must have been dead. I don't believe it for one minute. Which power station?
0:12:44 > 0:12:46THEY LAUGH
0:12:49 > 0:12:53'Three weeks in, the miners' tactics had paid off.'
0:12:55 > 0:13:01'The government has already imposed a ban on the use of electricity for street lighting and advertising.'
0:13:01 > 0:13:03'The ban now also includes heating in offices,
0:13:03 > 0:13:06'shops, public halls and places of entertainment.'
0:13:06 > 0:13:13'But despite the discomfort, this time the public were more prepared to soldier on.'
0:13:13 > 0:13:18'Girls from a local factory demonstrated their sympathy for the strike in a lunchtime march past.'
0:13:18 > 0:13:24I think there was a very strong feeling that the miners
0:13:24 > 0:13:27were a really heroic band of men...
0:13:29 > 0:13:36..who did a very hard and dangerous and unpleasant job on our behalf.
0:13:38 > 0:13:41They were seen as a critical group of workers
0:13:41 > 0:13:43who played a major, critical role
0:13:43 > 0:13:48and who figured quite prominently in many popular images
0:13:48 > 0:13:52of what it meant to be British or English.
0:13:54 > 0:13:59'And a review of the miners' demands took a sympathetic stance.'
0:13:59 > 0:14:04"The tribunal recommends big increases for Britain's 280,000 miners."
0:14:04 > 0:14:10'Conservative Prime Minister Edward Heath was forced to settle
0:14:10 > 0:14:13'and the miners returned to their pits victorious.
0:14:14 > 0:14:17'But industrial unrest rumbled on.
0:14:18 > 0:14:22'The following year, the miners put a ban on overtime.
0:14:23 > 0:14:25'And in the middle of an oil crisis,
0:14:25 > 0:14:28'Heath decided power would have to be rationed.'
0:14:28 > 0:14:32"We are limiting the use of electricity by almost all factories,
0:14:32 > 0:14:37"shops and offices to three days a week."
0:14:38 > 0:14:40On the days you're not allowed to use electricity,
0:14:40 > 0:14:43you can go in the office and operate and work
0:14:43 > 0:14:47as long as you don't use any electricity for heating or lighting.
0:14:48 > 0:14:52We were all quite young, so it was a bit of a laugh as much as anything.
0:14:52 > 0:14:55But the biggest thing was getting your customer's hair dry
0:14:55 > 0:14:57before the power went off
0:14:57 > 0:15:00and the dryers were gone and you couldn't dry their hair.
0:15:02 > 0:15:05You still had to do all your customers
0:15:05 > 0:15:07but in half the time.
0:15:09 > 0:15:14It was always felt, I think, that people would find ways round it. And they did, to some degree.
0:15:14 > 0:15:17I used to try and do three at a time.
0:15:17 > 0:15:22Some industries were producing almost as much as they would normally during those three days.
0:15:22 > 0:15:25You would set two under the dryer, comb one out
0:15:25 > 0:15:31- and it was like you were a robot. - Absolutely. It was a production line.
0:15:32 > 0:15:37It was a ploy to get people to react against the miners.
0:15:37 > 0:15:44They were determined that they had to get public opinion away from the miners and back to the government.
0:15:44 > 0:15:46Heath out! Heath out!
0:15:46 > 0:15:50'With his offer of conciliation spurned by the miners,
0:15:50 > 0:15:53'Heath threw himself on the mercy of the public,
0:15:53 > 0:15:56'asking them, "Just who governs Britain?"
0:15:56 > 0:16:02'The miners' strike is presented as the issue which forces the government to go to the people.'
0:16:02 > 0:16:04He looked for the support of the people to say,
0:16:04 > 0:16:08"The people support the government, you must now do a proper settlement."
0:16:08 > 0:16:13Certainly, that's what he hoped, and that's the basis on which the government fought the election.
0:16:13 > 0:16:17'But Mr Heath didn't get the answer he'd been hoping for.'
0:16:17 > 0:16:23The overriding feeling of the public is that the government ought never to have got itself in such a pickle.
0:16:23 > 0:16:27How has it happened? Why are you making life so uncomfortable for us?
0:16:27 > 0:16:33'Mr Heath resigns. He leaves the way clear for Mr Harold Wilson to form a government.'
0:16:35 > 0:16:40The incoming Labour government, its basic objective was to ensure
0:16:40 > 0:16:42that the miners stayed in the pits.
0:16:42 > 0:16:49Hence this programme of investment in new collieries and existing collieries.
0:16:49 > 0:16:55They brought a plan for coal out which was absolutely magnificent as far as we were concerned.
0:16:55 > 0:17:01It was going to give us secure employment and decent wages.
0:17:02 > 0:17:06'The Tories retreated to the opposition benches to lick their wounds.'
0:17:06 > 0:17:11For the Conservatives, it was massively traumatic
0:17:11 > 0:17:17that the whole legacy of 1974 was basically, "How do we avoid this ever again?"
0:17:22 > 0:17:27'Coal may have been king, but when it came to feeding our grid,
0:17:27 > 0:17:29'there had long been pretenders to the throne.'
0:17:34 > 0:17:38Of course, we can make electricity out of any fuel, and do,
0:17:38 > 0:17:41but the future undoubtedly lies with nuclear energy.
0:17:42 > 0:17:46'As far back as the early 1950s,
0:17:46 > 0:17:49'Britain had been at the forefront of nuclear research.'
0:17:50 > 0:17:53We were a little bit like pop stars in our own right.
0:17:54 > 0:17:59I once went to a conference and the News Chronicle, I think,
0:17:59 > 0:18:02had headlines on the front page, "Atom Man Will Be There."
0:18:04 > 0:18:06It's not bad if you're a young man.
0:18:08 > 0:18:12It was a glamorous industry.
0:18:12 > 0:18:14Clever young men in white coats
0:18:14 > 0:18:17doing mysterious things that nobody understood
0:18:17 > 0:18:22and producing power out of what appeared to be a little slug of metal.
0:18:22 > 0:18:27It was obviously much more interesting and impressive than dirty old coal mining.
0:18:29 > 0:18:33'British scientists had unlocked the secret of the atom.
0:18:33 > 0:18:36'The source of power may have been tiny
0:18:36 > 0:18:38'but it seemed to have one massive advantage.'
0:18:38 > 0:18:42Now, that is uranium.
0:18:42 > 0:18:46- 'This one pellet of fuel...' - 'One tonne of uranium...' - One fuel assembly...
0:18:46 > 0:18:51- '..will release as much energy as...'- '..a tonne of...' - ..2,600 tonnes...
0:18:51 > 0:18:55- '..10,000 tonnes...' - ..40,000 million tonnes of coal.
0:18:56 > 0:19:00The vision, in the 1950s, was that over time,
0:19:00 > 0:19:02nuclear power would become the dominant,
0:19:02 > 0:19:05possibly even the sole source of electricity, and beyond that.
0:19:12 > 0:19:17And the conscious, planned, purposive use of scientific progress
0:19:17 > 0:19:19to provide undreamed-of living standards
0:19:19 > 0:19:25and the possibility of leisure, ultimately, on an unbelievable scale.
0:19:25 > 0:19:28We were the very first country in the world
0:19:28 > 0:19:33to feed nuclear power into the National Grid.
0:19:33 > 0:19:38It is with pride that I now open Calder Hall,
0:19:38 > 0:19:41Britain's first atomic power station.
0:19:42 > 0:19:45'Now we produce more nuclear energy for peaceful purposes
0:19:45 > 0:19:49'than any other country in the world, half of the world total.'
0:19:49 > 0:19:53'For once, Britain seems to have outstripped all other runners.'
0:19:54 > 0:19:56'Throughout the 1960s,
0:19:56 > 0:20:01'our first model of nuclear power station, the Magnox, sprung up.
0:20:01 > 0:20:04'But although there were 11 of them in total,
0:20:04 > 0:20:08'they made up less than a tenth of our capacity to produce electricity.'
0:20:08 > 0:20:11There was no doubt that the Magnox stations did work.
0:20:11 > 0:20:16They were, in retrospect, expensive, but considering they were the first generation, they did well.
0:20:16 > 0:20:20Nevertheless, it was clear they would have to do better in the long term.
0:20:22 > 0:20:25'Determined to hold onto their position as world leaders,
0:20:25 > 0:20:32'British nuclear scientists set about designing something altogether shinier, bigger and better.'
0:20:32 > 0:20:36So a major research effort went into the so-called Advanced Gas-Cooled Reactor
0:20:36 > 0:20:39as the natural successor to the Magnox programme.
0:20:40 > 0:20:43'Enhanced Gas-Cooled Reactor,
0:20:43 > 0:20:47'prototype of the next stage in the development of reactors.'
0:20:47 > 0:20:53We'd done really quite well and thought we were pretty well on top of gas cooling.
0:20:53 > 0:20:56The British were very self-confident.
0:20:57 > 0:21:02The AGR fitted into this new mood in which Britain would be technologically superior to the world
0:21:02 > 0:21:07and it was thought to be a kind of spearhead of the British technological and export effort
0:21:07 > 0:21:13and the AGR would be the leading edge of new British technology, it would conquer the world.
0:21:15 > 0:21:19'British scientists seemed to be leading the field once again.
0:21:19 > 0:21:22'But just before the grid placed an order for its first AGR,
0:21:22 > 0:21:27'scientists from the United States steamed up on the inside lane.'
0:21:28 > 0:21:34The Americans had big firms which could supply complete power stations
0:21:34 > 0:21:39and were economically and technically very, very strong indeed.
0:21:39 > 0:21:44They had very strong and aggressive drive
0:21:44 > 0:21:48to spread American nuclear technology around the world.
0:21:49 > 0:21:53'The Americans had come up with their own design for a reactor.
0:21:53 > 0:21:56'One cooled with water rather than gas.
0:21:56 > 0:21:59'Both designs placed their bids for the business of the grid
0:21:59 > 0:22:02'in a head-to-head competition.
0:22:03 > 0:22:05'But as far as the British were concerned,
0:22:05 > 0:22:09'the American design had one clear disadvantage.'
0:22:09 > 0:22:12- NIH.- Not invented here. - It wasn't invented here.
0:22:13 > 0:22:18The Atomic Energy Authority saw the American design as a sort of routine technology.
0:22:18 > 0:22:24It wasn't seen as elegant science, if you know what I mean.
0:22:24 > 0:22:27Scientists were making the decisions in those days.
0:22:28 > 0:22:33'With their thoroughbred model, the home team was bound to impress.'
0:22:33 > 0:22:37'In May 1965, the British government announced that,
0:22:37 > 0:22:40'in face of competition from other established systems,
0:22:40 > 0:22:44'the first station of Britain's second nuclear power programme
0:22:44 > 0:22:48'will use the AGR, the Advanced Gas-Cooled Reactor.'
0:22:52 > 0:22:57I think that was entirely due to the Atomic Energy Authority insisting that we built British,
0:22:57 > 0:23:03that we had been the leaders of the technology and we should stay the leaders of the technology.
0:23:05 > 0:23:08'The recipient of Britain's first AGR
0:23:08 > 0:23:11'was to be Dungeness on the Kent coast.
0:23:13 > 0:23:19'Expectations were high. However, there was just one potential hiccup.'
0:23:19 > 0:23:27The long-term concern I would have is that we are the only country in the world building AGRs.
0:23:27 > 0:23:32It simply means that if we ever did have any trouble with them,
0:23:32 > 0:23:35we're the only people who know about them.
0:23:37 > 0:23:41'Undeterred, in the summer of 1965,
0:23:41 > 0:23:45'Britain embarked on the construction of the AGR at Dungeness.
0:23:49 > 0:23:51'In a remote corner of Wales, though,
0:23:51 > 0:23:58'another group of pioneers were hard at work on finding a very different fuel source for the grid.'
0:23:59 > 0:24:02People were very suspicious,
0:24:02 > 0:24:07not knowing what was happening there and curious.
0:24:08 > 0:24:13People thought of them as hippies and dropouts, flower people if you like.
0:24:13 > 0:24:17They rang to say about the delivery of the timber.
0:24:17 > 0:24:19We thought they were rather childish.
0:24:21 > 0:24:26'But local suspicions wouldn't stop an English aristocrat from realising his vision.'
0:24:29 > 0:24:32We believe that, in the Western world,
0:24:32 > 0:24:37we've been burning up our resources at an extremely prodigal rate.
0:24:37 > 0:24:40We're beginning to realise we're going to have to develop
0:24:40 > 0:24:43a style of life which is much more self-sufficient,
0:24:43 > 0:24:46much less dependent on outside resources.
0:24:46 > 0:24:50We're going to have to conserve the very finite resources of the Earth.
0:24:51 > 0:24:55'Using private funding, Gerard Morgan Grenville founded
0:24:55 > 0:24:59'the grandly named Centre for Alternative Technology.'
0:25:07 > 0:25:10It did feel like a really new thing.
0:25:10 > 0:25:14We knew of one or two other things in the USA and so on,
0:25:14 > 0:25:16but in Britain, there really wasn't much like that,
0:25:16 > 0:25:19certainly practical on-the-ground stuff.
0:25:20 > 0:25:23We didn't really know what we were working towards.
0:25:23 > 0:25:26We had this vague idea that we were trying to look at sustainability
0:25:26 > 0:25:31and use energy in the different way, but quite how, I don't think we knew.
0:25:31 > 0:25:35'In an attempt to prove their schemes were more than just pie in the sky,
0:25:35 > 0:25:39'they took the bold step of going off-grid.
0:25:39 > 0:25:44'At the centre, they'd have to rely on their new technologies entirely.'
0:25:44 > 0:25:48We had just about gone onto the mains electricity in those days
0:25:48 > 0:25:52and we'd left our turbines and our generating sets and our wind turbines
0:25:52 > 0:25:57and we were glorifying in the new electricity mains that had recently arrived
0:25:57 > 0:26:01and these people come along and they wanted to go back to what we'd just got rid of.
0:26:01 > 0:26:06We here, for instance, are going to show that you can produce electrical energy
0:26:06 > 0:26:09from windmills,
0:26:09 > 0:26:15you can produce heat from the power of the sun through solar heaters,
0:26:15 > 0:26:22that you can build houses which conserve their heat energy by better insulation.
0:26:25 > 0:26:29The first electricity-producing equipment we had on site
0:26:29 > 0:26:32was a small water turbine which we were given
0:26:32 > 0:26:36which produced a couple of kilowatts of electricity.
0:26:36 > 0:26:39And for quite a long time, that provided lighting around the site.
0:26:40 > 0:26:46A lot of the renewable energy technologies were themselves in a very early stage of development.
0:26:46 > 0:26:50We did end up with quite a few non-functional items.
0:26:51 > 0:26:54'The centre aspired to be a power station.
0:26:54 > 0:26:57'But apart from technical problems,
0:26:57 > 0:27:00'it was still some way off getting the rest of Britain to see the light.'
0:27:00 > 0:27:02SONG: "Theme from The Good Life"
0:27:02 > 0:27:07- This might look like an old diesel generator to you.- Yes, it does. - That's because it is.
0:27:07 > 0:27:11- Except that it's fuelled by methane. - Very ingenious but it'll never work.
0:27:11 > 0:27:14No, clever dick? Switch the light on, will you?
0:27:16 > 0:27:20Ooh. The glare. It's dazzling me.
0:27:23 > 0:27:27I thought it took the Mickey just about appropriately.
0:27:28 > 0:27:33'Renewable energy might not have been quite ready to plug into the grid,
0:27:33 > 0:27:38'but at Dungeness, the flagship of Britain's nuclear programme was some way off, too.
0:27:40 > 0:27:44'Ten years into construction, five years behind schedule
0:27:44 > 0:27:47'and nowhere near completion.'
0:27:47 > 0:27:52'The first AGR sits becalmed in the middle of the bird sanctuary of Dungeness like some large albatross.
0:27:52 > 0:27:56'It haunts the future of the British nuclear power programme.'
0:27:56 > 0:28:00'Why did we ever choose to build a reactor system as difficult as the AGR?'
0:28:00 > 0:28:04Nobody has a clue how much it's going to cost us.
0:28:04 > 0:28:07So, why is it that things have gone wrong?
0:28:09 > 0:28:12AGRs were undoubtedly a very complex technology.
0:28:12 > 0:28:15It was thought to be a very clever design and a very safe design,
0:28:15 > 0:28:20but it was never built because of its simplicity. It was an inherently complex machine.
0:28:21 > 0:28:26'Within the first few years, it was found that the boilers wouldn't fit into the reactors.
0:28:26 > 0:28:32'A giant central heating system in pieces with the boiler stuck in the front door.'
0:28:32 > 0:28:37We totally underestimated the development work you really need to do
0:28:37 > 0:28:41on a design of a nuclear power station before you start work.
0:28:41 > 0:28:46They really were developed during building, and you can't do that with power technology.
0:28:46 > 0:28:49Dungeness is doing particularly badly,
0:28:49 > 0:28:53but there's still a very strong constituency for technological nationalism.
0:28:53 > 0:28:55Many people in the Atomic Energy Authority
0:28:55 > 0:28:59still think that it's a good and safe design and we should follow it.
0:28:59 > 0:29:04'With no end in sight at Dungeness, undeterred once again,
0:29:04 > 0:29:08'scientists were already hard at work on four more AGRs.
0:29:08 > 0:29:15'But in the outside world, the nuclear industry was beginning to lose some of its sheen.'
0:29:17 > 0:29:21I don't think that, generally, the public were fully aware,
0:29:21 > 0:29:28at the time when the Queen opened Calder Hall,
0:29:28 > 0:29:32that Calder Hall was essentially a weapons plant.
0:29:32 > 0:29:39It was not a deception but it was definitely a spin.
0:29:40 > 0:29:44People who want the peaceful uses of nuclear energy
0:29:44 > 0:29:49have to face the fact that the explosive powers of uranium
0:29:49 > 0:29:52cannot be denied.
0:29:53 > 0:29:58And this is the problem that we are still wrestling with.
0:29:59 > 0:30:02'A connection was being forged in the public consciousness
0:30:02 > 0:30:07'between technology, science and something other than a bright future.'
0:30:07 > 0:30:10There was one great event in the world
0:30:10 > 0:30:15which had an unexpected consequence for nuclear power and that was the Vietnam War.
0:30:16 > 0:30:19The war resulted in some destruction of the environment
0:30:19 > 0:30:23and triggered a worldwide environmental movement.
0:30:26 > 0:30:33All the values that had driven the previous generation for modernism, technological progress,
0:30:33 > 0:30:37suddenly were turned on their heads.
0:30:37 > 0:30:42I am of that generation who very much
0:30:42 > 0:30:46succumbed to the view that we didn't want anything to do with any of it.
0:30:46 > 0:30:50It was spooky. Everything was spooky about nuclear power.
0:30:50 > 0:30:53There was a lot of anxiety attached to it.
0:30:55 > 0:30:58'In Sweden, in France, Japan and West Germany,
0:30:58 > 0:31:04'expansion plans for the nuclear industry have been met with protest and sometimes violence.'
0:31:07 > 0:31:10'This wave of opposition would hit British shores
0:31:10 > 0:31:13'when preparations began on the east coast of Scotland
0:31:13 > 0:31:16'on the final AGR to be connected to the grid.'
0:31:20 > 0:31:24The first time we went to Torness was May 1978
0:31:24 > 0:31:26and that was really just a festival.
0:31:28 > 0:31:32However, the level of support we received during that week
0:31:32 > 0:31:36from people living locally, who just came in their droves,
0:31:36 > 0:31:40was so overwhelming that at the end of the week,
0:31:40 > 0:31:45some of us who'd been involved said, "Right, we aren't going home, we're staying."
0:31:48 > 0:31:51By being here, it would appear that we are acting as some kind of focus
0:31:51 > 0:31:57for all the doubts and fears that the majority of people would seem to feel about nuclear power.
0:32:00 > 0:32:05A very simple idea. It was just take over a cottage, make it a home, make it a community.
0:32:05 > 0:32:09In retrospect, it looks fairly simple compared to
0:32:09 > 0:32:12the sophisticated things protesters do now, like digging tunnels
0:32:12 > 0:32:17or climbing trees or chaining themselves to bits of machinery
0:32:17 > 0:32:23and living in protest sites for years, but it was the start of those kind of things.
0:32:24 > 0:32:28They decided they were going to come and bulldoze us into the sea.
0:32:29 > 0:32:32'They'd occupied this site determined to prevent a nuclear power station.'
0:32:32 > 0:32:38People did extraordinary things, like climbing into bulldozers, and there were quite a few arrests.
0:32:39 > 0:32:42'Then the diggers and shovels moved in.'
0:32:43 > 0:32:47I remember being quite annoyed that I have very small hands
0:32:47 > 0:32:52so I wasn't awfully good at hanging onto this digger and I was shaken off quite easily
0:32:52 > 0:32:56but somebody with a bigger hand and a stronger grip could stay on longer.
0:32:56 > 0:32:58But it was scary. Of course it was.
0:32:58 > 0:33:00I can almost feel it now.
0:33:05 > 0:33:09It didn't achieve its primary objective of stopping Torness, cos it's been built,
0:33:09 > 0:33:13but we did form the basis of an anti-nuclear power movement,
0:33:13 > 0:33:16we did form the basis of non-violent direct action
0:33:16 > 0:33:21and we helped change the climate of public opinion in Britain against nuclear power.
0:33:22 > 0:33:28'But whilst the protestors were struggling to halt the building of new power stations,
0:33:28 > 0:33:32'the nuclear industry itself was struggling to make them run.
0:33:32 > 0:33:37'Dungeness B, now 14 years into construction, still wasn't finished.'
0:33:39 > 0:33:43Dungeness B did not start up until 1982.
0:33:43 > 0:33:45And even after the plant started up,
0:33:45 > 0:33:50it worked at less than five percent of its rated output for many years.
0:33:50 > 0:33:55It has been an embarrassment, almost unique.
0:33:55 > 0:33:58I don't think you can have the experience we've had
0:33:58 > 0:34:04with the Advanced Gas-Cooled Reactor without expecting some blame.
0:34:04 > 0:34:07- Do you feel you were wrong?- Yes.
0:34:08 > 0:34:11'And there was one woman who certainly agreed.
0:34:11 > 0:34:15'New Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher championed nuclear
0:34:15 > 0:34:18'but she wasn't having any truck with underperformance.'
0:34:20 > 0:34:23Margaret was a scientist and had always understood
0:34:23 > 0:34:30the huge advantage of utilising this almost underused source of power.
0:34:32 > 0:34:36She always supported my view that we ought to be building light water reactors
0:34:36 > 0:34:40and not these ridiculous gas-cooled reactors. And eventually we got Sizewell.
0:34:43 > 0:34:47'The Central Electricity Generating Board has named the site
0:34:47 > 0:34:51'for its first American system pressurised water nuclear reactor
0:34:51 > 0:34:56'at Sizewell on the Suffolk coast at a cost of about £1,000 billion.'
0:34:56 > 0:34:58For me, at that time, it was very exciting,
0:34:58 > 0:35:02because Mrs Thatcher had decided we were going to build
0:35:02 > 0:35:05nuclear power stations and we were going to use the American design.
0:35:05 > 0:35:08We were joining the club, if you like.
0:35:08 > 0:35:11This is it, Bob, it's the stage three consent.
0:35:11 > 0:35:13She wanted us to build ten identical designs.
0:35:13 > 0:35:18From an engineering and commercial point of view, that was what we'd needed to hear for a very long time.
0:35:18 > 0:35:25'But a strategy for nuclear was just one part of Thatcher's plan to redraw the power map of Britain.'
0:35:26 > 0:35:32The nuclear industry depended on scientists and engineers
0:35:32 > 0:35:36who were not the sort of people one expected to strike.
0:35:36 > 0:35:41'And the massive investment in coal pits conceded at the end of the last miners' strike
0:35:41 > 0:35:44'had had an unforeseen consequence.'
0:35:44 > 0:35:48By the end of the 1970s, into the early 1980s,
0:35:48 > 0:35:52coal production is surging, coal is piling up at the pit heads,
0:35:52 > 0:35:56it's piling up in the stocking grounds, but the market for coal is actually contracting.
0:35:56 > 0:36:00And the net result of this is a crisis of overproduction.
0:36:00 > 0:36:04And the only response that the Coal Board has is to close pits.
0:36:05 > 0:36:07Everybody knew Thatcher was coming.
0:36:07 > 0:36:11She'd said she was going to get us when she came to power in '79.
0:36:11 > 0:36:14She made no secret of the fact that she wanted revenge
0:36:14 > 0:36:17for what the miners had done in '72 and '74.
0:36:19 > 0:36:21Scargill was asking for the impossible.
0:36:21 > 0:36:24For him to simply say not a single coal mine must be closed,
0:36:24 > 0:36:28not a single miner was to lose their job was utterly and totally unrealistic.
0:36:28 > 0:36:34But Scargill was right. And he said, "She's coming for you, she hasn't appointed Macgregor for nothing,
0:36:34 > 0:36:38- "Macgregor's come to close pits." - Would the prospect of a strike
0:36:38 > 0:36:42- make you think again about your plans to close these pits?- No.
0:36:42 > 0:36:45This is going to happen whether we have a strike or not.
0:36:45 > 0:36:47Now, we either stand up and fight like men
0:36:47 > 0:36:51or you go down on your knees and you bow down to it. It's your choice.
0:36:55 > 0:37:02The Coal Board, the government, is about to embark on a wide-ranging pit closure programme.
0:37:02 > 0:37:05And this time the argument was there was nowhere else
0:37:05 > 0:37:09for the displaced miner to go. There were no more coalfields to move to.
0:37:09 > 0:37:13This was about massive job losses, pit closures,
0:37:13 > 0:37:18destruction of communities and so on and so forth. Not about pay, about pit closures.
0:37:19 > 0:37:22'56,000 miners to strike
0:37:22 > 0:37:25'and Ian Macgregor takes a tough line.'
0:37:25 > 0:37:29They provoked us in March, right at the end of winter.
0:37:29 > 0:37:34So that first bit of the strike was all the way through the summer.
0:37:34 > 0:37:37Which, from the electricity generating industry's point of view
0:37:37 > 0:37:41was ideal, because that's the time
0:37:41 > 0:37:44when you stop pressing that switch,
0:37:44 > 0:37:46when you don't need the lights as much.
0:37:46 > 0:37:51The electricity generating industry is not using as much coal.
0:37:52 > 0:37:55So they had the upper hand from the start.
0:37:57 > 0:38:03The '72 and '74 had geed us up a bit, but that was a long time ago and things had changed a lot.
0:38:03 > 0:38:05We knew we had a battle on our hands.
0:38:06 > 0:38:10'Hostilities broke out as police kept open the routes
0:38:10 > 0:38:13'for lorry drivers to move essential supplies
0:38:13 > 0:38:17'across picket lines and into coal-fired power stations.'
0:38:17 > 0:38:20SHOUTING
0:38:23 > 0:38:26'But away from the traditional fields of conflict,
0:38:26 > 0:38:29'there were now sleeping giants in the grid network.'
0:38:32 > 0:38:37'For nearly five months, the Isle of Grain oil-fired power station in Kent,
0:38:37 > 0:38:41'scheduled to be the biggest in Europe, has stood idle.'
0:38:43 > 0:38:50I decided to move to Grain, as it was going to be the largest oil-fired power station in Europe.
0:38:50 > 0:38:53Oil prices went through the roof
0:38:53 > 0:38:57due to problems in the Middle East
0:38:57 > 0:38:59and we just didn't get generation.
0:38:59 > 0:39:06We were sat around waiting for the call that never came and there were months went past, sometimes,
0:39:06 > 0:39:09where we just didn't do any generation.
0:39:09 > 0:39:12'To keep the lights on during the strike,
0:39:12 > 0:39:16'the grid's chairman roused Britain's slumbering oil-fired power stations
0:39:16 > 0:39:18'and sparked them into life.'
0:39:20 > 0:39:23If we are making electricity with oil
0:39:23 > 0:39:26then we don't have to make it with coal.
0:39:29 > 0:39:36We were suddenly back in the limelight and we were expected to get up and running.
0:39:36 > 0:39:39We were then doing what we were there to do.
0:39:39 > 0:39:42We've got problems, particularly from inside Grain Power Station,
0:39:42 > 0:39:47which since our dispute has been on, has been going out all the time
0:39:47 > 0:39:50and making a big contribution to the National Grid.
0:39:51 > 0:39:56A lot of us were torn with the fact that we supported the miners, being trade unionists,
0:39:56 > 0:40:00but our station was suddenly back on the map.
0:40:01 > 0:40:05'Before the strike, oil-fired power stations generated
0:40:05 > 0:40:08'just four percent of our grid's needs.
0:40:08 > 0:40:13'Now this rocketed to almost half. But at a cost.
0:40:13 > 0:40:15'Four billion pounds.'
0:40:16 > 0:40:18They were certainly one of the secret cards.
0:40:18 > 0:40:24Expensive, but that was not the primary concern. The primary concern was to keep the lights on.
0:40:25 > 0:40:29This was absolutely critical, because once the lights stayed on,
0:40:29 > 0:40:34then the dispute could simply be projected as localised, something happening elsewhere,
0:40:34 > 0:40:41and Mrs Thatcher was determined that whatever else happened, normal life would continue for most people.
0:40:42 > 0:40:48Stop the power, stop the electricity, and they've got to go to the negotiating table.
0:40:48 > 0:40:53They had to in '72, they had to in '74, '84 was no different.
0:40:53 > 0:40:56They still would've had to go to the negotiating table.
0:40:56 > 0:40:59Problem was, we couldn't stop the electricity.
0:41:02 > 0:41:06'Not only was the grid calling on other fuel sources,
0:41:06 > 0:41:09'the miners themselves were divided.'
0:41:10 > 0:41:14I've been here since 5:30 this morning to come to work.
0:41:14 > 0:41:18And I intend coming to work, not to picket my own pit.
0:41:20 > 0:41:24'Pits in the Midlands were still producing tonnes of coal.'
0:41:28 > 0:41:30I'd never been to Nottinghamshire before, ever.
0:41:30 > 0:41:35I don't think most of us had. It was a lot more rural than I thought.
0:41:35 > 0:41:39Quite northern in comparison with us southern softies.
0:41:40 > 0:41:45I don't think anything could prepare any of us for the sheer scale of policing up in Nottingham.
0:41:45 > 0:41:47It was an enormous event.
0:41:48 > 0:41:53The biggest policing operation of the twentieth century and nothing's been repeated like it since.
0:41:54 > 0:41:57We went down into Nottingham and that was scary.
0:41:57 > 0:42:02It was like she surrounded the county with an army of police.
0:42:04 > 0:42:07'Midlands pits were staying loyal to their biggest customer,
0:42:07 > 0:42:10'the large power stations right on their doorstep.'
0:42:12 > 0:42:14In the central coalfields, like Nottinghamshire,
0:42:14 > 0:42:17with what appeared to be a secure future,
0:42:17 > 0:42:23there was a strong sense of, "Why should we go on strike? Our future is secure" and so on.
0:42:26 > 0:42:32'Six months in, the strike was playing out without a flicker in people's homes.
0:42:32 > 0:42:35'Desperate to make an impact on the grid,
0:42:35 > 0:42:38'the miners appealed to the public for support.'
0:42:38 > 0:42:40There was the campaign Switch On At Six.
0:42:41 > 0:42:44I do remember Switch On At Six.
0:42:44 > 0:42:47And you'd find that the miners' spokesmen at the Commons,
0:42:47 > 0:42:52like Dennis Skinner, were constantly rushing round switching everything on
0:42:52 > 0:42:56because they thought that would damage the government's programme.
0:42:56 > 0:42:59But it didn't seem to happen.
0:42:59 > 0:43:01We weren't able to detect any effect at all.
0:43:02 > 0:43:04It seemed to be a complete damp squib.
0:43:05 > 0:43:08We were just getting on with our lives,
0:43:08 > 0:43:12and that's quite worrying. It means the miners were, indeed,
0:43:12 > 0:43:15becoming parts of history.
0:43:19 > 0:43:23I think, by the 80s, attitudes to the miners had definitely changed.
0:43:23 > 0:43:27I think we felt they were holding the country to ransom.
0:43:28 > 0:43:32And in hindsight, I don't know if actually they were.
0:43:32 > 0:43:34I think we had all become more selfish.
0:43:36 > 0:43:40You were more concerned about your own economics and things,
0:43:40 > 0:43:44rather than people as a whole.
0:43:46 > 0:43:50And the miners were forced to surrender and they recognised...
0:43:50 > 0:43:54They made the best of it as they could, marching with banners,
0:43:54 > 0:43:57but the fact of the matter is they'd shot their bolt
0:43:57 > 0:44:01and it had not hit its target and the country kept going.
0:44:03 > 0:44:07'Britain's longest running national strike is over.
0:44:07 > 0:44:11'Miners' delegates voted to end the strike without an agreement on pit closures.'
0:44:13 > 0:44:17The old Britain was, right up to the end of the miners' strike,
0:44:17 > 0:44:23about people who dug, shoed, delved, span, made things,
0:44:23 > 0:44:27and the new Britain was going to be a much more effete world
0:44:27 > 0:44:29of people who are just going to shop.
0:44:33 > 0:44:36I certainly remember buying a computer.
0:44:36 > 0:44:41All the neighbours were really jealous cos we got this big, tall fridge freezer that's great.
0:44:42 > 0:44:47Commodore 64, that was my first computer. Then I advanced from that.
0:44:47 > 0:44:50It was a Betamax recorder that we got
0:44:50 > 0:44:55but then we had to move on, probably about '86, '87, we got the VHS.
0:44:56 > 0:45:02I went down to London, I got a good job after the end of the strike and I got the latest colour television
0:45:02 > 0:45:05and the latest microwave oven.
0:45:05 > 0:45:08'And with consumerism at an all-time high,
0:45:08 > 0:45:12'we were now offered the ultimate electrical fix.'
0:45:12 > 0:45:17'Soon, anyone who uses electricity will be able to apply for shares.
0:45:17 > 0:45:21'So you could buy into what you plug into.'
0:45:22 > 0:45:26'In privatising the entire electricity industry,
0:45:26 > 0:45:30'Thatcher planned to sell power to the people.'
0:45:34 > 0:45:40We bought shares in all the newly-privatising companies. We did quite well out of them.
0:45:41 > 0:45:45'The government's biggest privatisation is already an unqualified success.'
0:45:46 > 0:45:49I hadn't got any money to spare.
0:45:49 > 0:45:52Everybody needs it. It's a good bet.
0:45:52 > 0:45:55We were caught up in this. Everything was wonderful.
0:45:55 > 0:46:00People were allowed, for the first time in their life, to have shares. Working-class people.
0:46:00 > 0:46:04Yes, we bought shares in electricity.
0:46:05 > 0:46:10'But the package people were buying wasn't quite the one the government had hoped to sell.'
0:46:12 > 0:46:19'In preparing the deal, the City had been taking a long, hard look at the books.'
0:46:19 > 0:46:23In 1988, when the government introduced the privatisation white paper,
0:46:23 > 0:46:27I got a call asking me to join James Caple, who had been appointed
0:46:27 > 0:46:30the government's broker in charge of the privatisation.
0:46:31 > 0:46:35Now, the trouble that we had is that before privatisation,
0:46:35 > 0:46:41I think it's fair to say, the accounts of the CGB weren't looked at too hard by the auditors.
0:46:41 > 0:46:43That world was over.
0:46:45 > 0:46:48'The finances of the entire industry were scrutinised.
0:46:48 > 0:46:53'But there was one particular sector that would really feel the heat. Nuclear.'
0:46:55 > 0:46:58Then we established a number of hit teams
0:46:58 > 0:47:01that went round the nuclear industry and the more and more they looked,
0:47:01 > 0:47:04the more and more there were costs that were guessed.
0:47:04 > 0:47:08When they delved into it, they could see lots of them were underestimates.
0:47:10 > 0:47:14I think we got carried away with the science of nuclear power
0:47:14 > 0:47:19and the way the industry was structured was the public sector Atomic Energy Authority.
0:47:19 > 0:47:23It led to a position where decisions were taken
0:47:23 > 0:47:26that had no commercial basis at all.
0:47:27 > 0:47:32'And prospective buyers were troubled by something of an accounting oversight.'
0:47:32 > 0:47:36The other problem in those days was it was being pushed by the scientists
0:47:36 > 0:47:43that wanted to move onto the next design. And they didn't think very hard about decommissioning.
0:47:44 > 0:47:47At the time, one of the Financial Times newsletters
0:47:47 > 0:47:49carried out an analysis that suggested that
0:47:49 > 0:47:53the decommissioning cost for the existing nuclear plants
0:47:53 > 0:47:57might amount to as much as £15 billion, at the time,
0:47:57 > 0:48:03which was likely to be more than the government would raise from the sale of the entire electricity system.
0:48:05 > 0:48:08The difficulty with radioactivity is that you can't shut it off.
0:48:08 > 0:48:10So it is a long-term problem.
0:48:10 > 0:48:14And it's a long-term cost, because you can't just go away and leave it.
0:48:15 > 0:48:19It was assumed the taxpayer would pick up the tab.
0:48:19 > 0:48:21But if you're selling the power stations,
0:48:21 > 0:48:24people who might be tempted to buy them will say,
0:48:24 > 0:48:28"Is the taxpayer going to pick up the tab or are we going to have to pay?"
0:48:28 > 0:48:33The first reaction was, "Until we know what it is, we can't possibly bid." So they were withdrawn.
0:48:34 > 0:48:39'The government is expected to abandon the privatisation of nuclear power this afternoon.'
0:48:39 > 0:48:44'..her government is admitting the cost of that power is simply too high to sustain
0:48:44 > 0:48:48'within Britain's privatised electricity industry.'
0:48:48 > 0:48:52The government was extremely angry when they found out about the cost of nuclear
0:48:52 > 0:48:57and thought they should've known beforehand. Don't forget that Lord Marshall
0:48:57 > 0:49:03had been Thatcher's friend because of the miners' strike. He was sacked.
0:49:05 > 0:49:10'And with Marshall went Thatcher's plan for a nuclear grid.
0:49:11 > 0:49:14'In the new liberalised energy market,
0:49:14 > 0:49:18'private companies would opt for gas-fired power stations.
0:49:19 > 0:49:26'Britain's AGRs were now all running but the government scrapped plans for any further nuclear power.
0:49:27 > 0:49:31'Sizewell B, already halfway through construction,
0:49:31 > 0:49:35'would be Britain's first and last American-style reactor.'
0:49:35 > 0:49:39Sizewell B was designed by the architects of Gatwick Airport
0:49:39 > 0:49:44and they were able to push for a building with some charisma.
0:49:46 > 0:49:51The ceramic dome on the top of the building really does make it look like a temple, a temple of power,
0:49:51 > 0:49:56and that was very definitely an attempt to give power production,
0:49:56 > 0:49:59electricity production, nuclear energy
0:49:59 > 0:50:05that sense of being connected back to a world where it was hugely respected.
0:50:08 > 0:50:12When we finally got it right, nuclear power had fallen out of favour
0:50:12 > 0:50:15because of the very poor performance of the AGR power stations.
0:50:15 > 0:50:20I've not visited Sizewell for some time. I find it painful.
0:50:20 > 0:50:24It reminds me of what might have been. Reminds me of what might have been.
0:50:27 > 0:50:32'Nuclear power was finally partly privatised six years later.
0:50:32 > 0:50:39'But to date, no commercial company has built a nuclear power station without government subsidy.
0:50:39 > 0:50:42'So far, they have proved too financially risky.
0:50:42 > 0:50:48'Instead, cheap North Sea gas became the City's favourite fuel.
0:50:48 > 0:50:52'And it was gas that finally took King Coal's crown.
0:50:52 > 0:50:57We, in Britain, have got the most incredible energy resources
0:50:57 > 0:51:03and I think, because we have, we have never really husbanded them
0:51:03 > 0:51:05in the way that we should've done.
0:51:05 > 0:51:08We've just used the oil we had,
0:51:08 > 0:51:11we've used the coal we've had
0:51:11 > 0:51:13and then we've used the gas we've had.
0:51:13 > 0:51:17And now we are importing increasing amounts
0:51:17 > 0:51:22and that must have some implications for our security.
0:51:24 > 0:51:28Power starts to become something that we purchase on world markets.
0:51:28 > 0:51:31It can be diverted here and there, the grid can feed here,
0:51:31 > 0:51:35it's seen as a virtue that we're versatile in this way.
0:51:35 > 0:51:38It's another aspect of our modernity.
0:51:41 > 0:51:45Then there's no elemental connection to the power station any more.
0:51:45 > 0:51:47The power station floats free.
0:51:47 > 0:51:51It's only with the arrival of environmental consciousness at a widespread level
0:51:51 > 0:51:55that the power stations begin to come instantiated again,
0:51:55 > 0:51:58begin to kind of beam down again and be there.
0:51:59 > 0:52:03'The power station is now back in our consciousness.
0:52:03 > 0:52:08'Like never before, questions are being asked about who owns them,
0:52:08 > 0:52:13what feeds them and even, "Do you want one of your very own?"
0:52:21 > 0:52:27- It's going to pick up about ten o'clock tonight. - Yep, eight miles an hour.- Yep.
0:52:30 > 0:52:35So this is the barn where the meters for the wind turbine are housed.
0:52:38 > 0:52:40On the Sunday, it'll be good.
0:52:41 > 0:52:44This meter is the total generation meter,
0:52:44 > 0:52:49which measures the total amount of electricity that the wind turbine produces.
0:52:50 > 0:52:53Certainly, my parents were very supportive.
0:52:53 > 0:52:57I think Neil's parents were less supportive, weren't they?
0:52:57 > 0:53:03Maybe it's the fact that they live next door. But, certainly, there was a slight opposition from them.
0:53:03 > 0:53:06I didn't like the idea of it at all.
0:53:06 > 0:53:10I thought it might spoil the view from my kitchen window.
0:53:10 > 0:53:14And I thought, "Where do I buy some gelignite?"
0:53:14 > 0:53:21But that feeling went and Neil explained that it might save me on the electricity.
0:53:21 > 0:53:25So that's the real reason. Finance.
0:53:26 > 0:53:31The import meter's showing units we've bought from the National Grid.
0:53:31 > 0:53:37And the export meter is showing units sold to the National Grid.
0:53:37 > 0:53:43The amount we use in a year on the farm and the two houses is about 4,000 kilowatts.
0:53:43 > 0:53:49The turbine averaging over the year is going to produce about 18,000 kilowatts.
0:53:49 > 0:53:54So we're actually going to be exporting to the grid about 14,000 kilowatts per year.
0:53:56 > 0:54:01I find it a wonderful thought that I could pump electricity back into the National Grid
0:54:01 > 0:54:07and it's as if one can actually take power, literally, into one's own hands.
0:54:07 > 0:54:10Power to the people.
0:54:11 > 0:54:16'But the people are, as ever, divided about the impact of the grid on our landscape.'
0:54:17 > 0:54:21In many ways, the modern windmill is a return to the past,
0:54:21 > 0:54:27those Dutch old masters, the slow, lazy swing of the blades glinting in the sunlight,
0:54:27 > 0:54:30the clouds passing, it's quite a traditional image.
0:54:32 > 0:54:37Aesthetically, they're like an array of Meccano models on the skyline.
0:54:37 > 0:54:40I prefer my skylines without them.
0:54:42 > 0:54:46I think of wind turbines as wind creatures.
0:54:47 > 0:54:54When I see a great field of them with their sails seeming to stitch the sky to the horizon,
0:54:54 > 0:55:00as if they're making a garment of the world in that way, I think that they're incredibly hopeful.
0:55:01 > 0:55:07I often wonder what the public's reaction to electricity pylons was when they were first erected.
0:55:07 > 0:55:10Something none of us look at nowadays.
0:55:10 > 0:55:13I'm sure if we have thousands of wind turbines,
0:55:13 > 0:55:16in a few years' time, we won't give them a second look, either.
0:55:18 > 0:55:21'Since the first pylon went up,
0:55:21 > 0:55:25'we've believed plugging in was progress.
0:55:25 > 0:55:28'Now, for the first time in our grid's history,
0:55:28 > 0:55:33'we're having to consider the merits, instead, of switching off.'
0:55:33 > 0:55:36You don't open the tap until you put the plug in the bath.
0:55:36 > 0:55:39The thing to do is to stop thinking entirely about supply
0:55:39 > 0:55:42and start thinking about how we use it first.
0:55:42 > 0:55:45Then it'll be a lot easier to supply what we actually need.
0:55:45 > 0:55:51You know, it's ask not what the grid can do for you, to paraphrase JF Kennedy,
0:55:51 > 0:55:54but ask only what you can do for it.
0:55:56 > 0:55:58'Throughout the life of our grid,
0:55:58 > 0:56:02'different fuels have waxed and waned under its patronage.
0:56:02 > 0:56:06'And decisions taken in its name have shaped not just our physical
0:56:06 > 0:56:09'but our political landscape.
0:56:10 > 0:56:15'75 years on, our energy map is changing once again.'
0:56:15 > 0:56:19The UK is going to have coal plants come offline,
0:56:19 > 0:56:23we're going to have nuclear power plants come to the end of their life.
0:56:23 > 0:56:26At the most extreme, people are talking about
0:56:26 > 0:56:33half, three quarters of our generation stopping within the next ten, 20 years.
0:56:33 > 0:56:36We have to fulfil our renewable energy directive,
0:56:36 > 0:56:41which means that 20 percent of our energy has to come from renewables by 2020.
0:56:41 > 0:56:45That should be viewed as an opportunity.
0:56:45 > 0:56:50'So now, just how will we choose to keep the lights on?'
0:56:52 > 0:56:55The great thing about coal is you can store it on site.
0:56:55 > 0:56:59With a gas-fired power station, you're at the end of a long pipeline.
0:56:59 > 0:57:02So coal has a role to play for years to come, but a reduced role,
0:57:02 > 0:57:07and we have to clean it up using a technology called carbon capture and storage.
0:57:07 > 0:57:12To live without electricity would quickly be almost impossible.
0:57:12 > 0:57:15I don't think we, as a nation, are capable of doing that.
0:57:15 > 0:57:18Gas power stations can be very flexible,
0:57:18 > 0:57:22they can be ramped up when we need it and that's why we need to continue to keep gas
0:57:22 > 0:57:24right at the heart of energy in the UK.
0:57:25 > 0:57:29I wouldn't mind living without electricity for a month a year. That'd be quite good.
0:57:29 > 0:57:34It'd be quite a challenge and it'd be quite educational to see what you could and couldn't do.
0:57:34 > 0:57:36So if our grid and our wind farms
0:57:36 > 0:57:39are spread across the country and offshore,
0:57:39 > 0:57:42then we can guarantee a secure supply.
0:57:42 > 0:57:45The wind will always be blowing somewhere.
0:57:45 > 0:57:48- Dark.- Horrendous.- Cold.
0:57:48 > 0:57:52- Yeah.- Children! They can't live without central heating. - Pretty dull, really.
0:57:53 > 0:57:58Nuclear power generation not only helps us to reduce our carbon emissions,
0:57:58 > 0:58:01but maintains our security of supply, helping to maintain
0:58:01 > 0:58:04a standard of living that we're all used to here in the UK.
0:58:04 > 0:58:06You don't need a lot of power.
0:58:06 > 0:58:11I think I could happily exist on a very small amount of electricity,
0:58:11 > 0:58:13but enough to make some electronics doable.
0:58:13 > 0:58:16Yeah, that's probably true of you. Definitely.
0:58:16 > 0:58:19I mean, life would stop, wouldn't it?
0:58:19 > 0:58:21I prefer not to think about it.
0:58:28 > 0:58:32Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd
0:58:32 > 0:58:36E-mail subtitling@bbc.co.uk
0:58:36 > 0:58:36.