Quality Supply Infrastructure & Resilience - the backbone of energy systems - the tranmission infrastructures for Power, Gas, Oil, Hydrogen and even pneumatic (air) pressure
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- Written by: Thanks to Kathryn Porter's independent analysis, including Gas Security: The Foundation of Energy Security (September 2026)
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Gas Security Is Energy Security — and Bio-Methane CCHP Is the Missing Half
Sep 28, 2026 · @John C Burke
Britain's gas system is the foundation of its energy security, and policy has been treating it as a problem to retire rather than an asset to secure. That is the core finding of Gas Security: The Foundation of Energy Security, published in September 2026 by Kathryn Porter of the independent consultancy Watt-Logic. [Download her Full Report HERE]
For readers of Sun Earth Energy, the report is welcome confirmation of arguments we have made for over a decade. Porter supplies the market diagnosis. This article sets out the prescription her report leaves out: bio-methane in the gas grid, burned in high-efficiency combined cooling, heat and power (CCHP), inside an integrated urban energy system.
The two halves belong together. Her work shows why the gas network must be kept strong. Ours shows how to make it domestic, renewable and far more efficient.
The diagnosis: what Porter's report finds
Porter's central finding is that gas's role is more enduring, and the gas system more fragile, than current policy assumes. Her evidence falls into six points.
- Electricity is only part of the story. Even fully decarbonised, electricity meets only about a fifth of UK final energy demand. Space heating and industrial process heat remain on gas for decades.
- The heat-pump arithmetic does not work on current timescales. Around 23–24 million homes use gas boilers. The UK installed about 105,000 heat pumps in 2025, a record year. Even at the reduced target of 450,000 a year, replacing the boiler stock would take around 50 years.
- Networks, not gas, are now driving bills up. Wholesale and network costs have both roughly doubled since 2017. Constraint payments more than trebled to £1.9 billion in 2025–26, and the National Audit Office has criticised the Connect & Manage approach.
- The North Sea could fall off a cliff, not a slope. Offshore pipelines such as CATS, SAGE and FLAGS need a minimum throughput to stay viable. The 2018 Theddlethorpe closure stranded 22 Southern North Sea fields at once.
- Storage is thin. Britain holds around sixteen days of gas demand in storage, and the future of Rough still awaits a funding decision.
- Imports are not guaranteed under stress. Norwegian reservoirs are at twenty-year lows, the French nuclear fleet is ageing, and cold, still weather tends to hit Britain and its neighbours at the same time.
Her recommendations follow: fix the misunderstanding of how gas is priced, raise domestic production, cut reliance on electricity imports, model gas and electricity together, focus on cheap energy, and treat energy security as national security.
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- Written by: J C Burke
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First and foremost the UK has several grids:
- The National Grid {Electricity Pylons and Infrastructure} Electricity is a Secondary Energy Medium
- The Gas Grid {Natural Gas - mostly methane, but other gases too in this "mix"} Natural GAS is a Primary Energy Source
- The Aviation Fuel and Oil Pipelines {as Refined Primary Energy Sources}
- Fibre Backbone - Communication and Control {including some of the above}
"National Gas Transmission is the backbone of Britain’s energy system today and we are working to play a leading role in the transition to a clean energy future that works for every home and business. We own and operate the national gas network, delivering energy to where it is needed in every part of the country."
"Gas is currently a critical part of Britain's energy needs. We keep households warm and underpin their quality of life. For business, we fuel growth and innovation, and we are looking to the future by developing the hydrogen transmission system of tomorrow." {more about the problems with Hydrogen Transmission - at the expense of Natural Gas - later}
But the Electricity Grid has a large % of electricity provided by the GAS GRID!
- "More clean energy for all: The Great Grid Upgrade will enable the electricity grid to carry more clean energy to communities in every part of England and Wales, helping us all reach net zero faster."
- "A grid that's fit for the future: As we continue to reduce our reliance on fossil fuels and increase clean energy generation, we’ll be using more electricity than ever. That means we’ll need a grid that’s able to carry all this extra electricity to wherever we might need it."
These are great marketing "messages" {or social massages} but not everything here makes logical sense! Now that "fossil fuels" have been discovered on Titan!
"Saturn's moon Titan has hundreds of times more liquid hydrocarbons than ALL THE KNOWN OIL AND NATURAL GAS RESERVES ON EARTH, according to new data from NASA's Cassini spacecraft." Source NASA 2008 So can we all dispense with the misnomer "Fossil Fuels" now?
So here lies the nub of the problem; DISINFORMATION - and predominantly from Governments and many agenda driven agencies.
So we need a coherent and INCLUSIVE energy strategy;
that includes generation/production/discovery {of primary energy}, distribution, Delivery and Efficient Technologies!
First Major Issue is the INEFFICIENCY of our {Mainly} CENTRALISED POWER GENERATION SYSTEM.
See previous articles to understand where the energy 'liberated' at the {traditional Power Station {Gas, Oil, Coal} Net Zero; EV Infrastructure Needs; Live Generation Mix - {this needs to be viewed at various times of the day & night}; AT BEST ONLY 35-40% of the Heat energy from Gas. oil or coal is used the generate ELECTRICITY {similar to the USA too}
So Centralised Power Generation is INEFFICIENT - therefore Expanding the Electricity Grid need to be considered within this context. So National Grid powered EVs and Heat Pumps can never be considered efficient and comparable with other sources of DECENTRALISED ENERGY GENERATION. Indeed many more householders must turn towards their own "Off-GRID" energy provision {Solar Thermal Panels, Solar PV Panels, Small Scale Wind {VAWT} and even Mini/Micro Hydro where applicable.
But the fakery of the current messages - and artificially inflated energy prices to the consumer must be challenged. We are all being taken as fools! The false gods of Climate change, CO2 reductions, 'Carbon Capture', Net Zero, Climate Emergency, Fossil Fuels and Just Stop must be cast out {of the church of logic}!! All this is simply {false} marketing-hype! in fact the cynicism is so bad, that they have truncated CO2 [Carbon Dioxide] to simply "Carbon" - which is you and I - is this a cull of the Human Race??.