Minimal

Blyth Power Station

Took the car and camera on another digital photography practice session today. Our destination this time was Blyth Power Station at Cambois (pronounced cammus) in Northumberland. Once again I failed to apply the stuff I’d learnt from advice I’d read on the web. Once again, it’s Paint Shop Pro to the rescue.

Today was more than just a photo shoot, though. This was the first time I’d seen the power station up close, despite having lived within sight of it for over 20 years now. In fact, there probably aren’t that many places in South-East Northumberland where you can’t see it. Its smoke stacks tower over Blyth, the whole place managing to look enormous, even from many miles away.

But not for much longer. Later this coming year, Blyth Power Station will be but a memory on the local landscape. The demolition crews are already in and working and the place looks rather worse for wear. Call me sad if you will, but I find it quite poetic that right alongside the death of this monument to past industries we find the metaphorical green shoots of Blyth’s offshore and coastal wind farms. The coal that fired the old power station may be long gone, but we can still contribute to the national grid, dammit. If only things didn’t take so long to move on.

Of course, a few windmills aren’t going to replace the jobs that have gone, either in the coal industry or the power station itself. I just wish we could’ve gone one step further and set up something even more positive — a windmill factory, for instance. One industry’s death usually coincides with the birth of another, but Britain has failed to seize the initiative. Despite being ideally placed to be a test-ground for the things, we’ve let it slip and the Danes have got in there instead. Well, good luck to ‘em. Maybe they’ll set up a factory over here one day. Or maybe, just maybe, our Government will pull its finger out and give wind power the big push. We can but hope.