The message
from Matt contains these words:

Don't forget that one of the reasons for the decline in coal generation
and the 'dash for gas' is the lesser quantity of CO2 produced for the
same energy output. Coal is not going to make a come-back until the
better options are exhausted.

The dash for gas was purely due to a very localised short term gas
price advantage over other fuel sources. The CO2 released was of
absolutely no concern to any power producer and would have
realistically formed no part in a decision to invest as there were no
economic advantages in doing so (any incentives to go down this route
have only emerged around 3 years ago) The UK's earliest combined cycle
gas fired station commenced generation some 10 years earlier in late
1992.

But the political imperatives to reduce CO2 have been around for that long.

Yes, in most cases they are much more efficient than 60's and 70's
generation coal and oil fired stations leading to a lower release of
CO2, but gas is a clean fuel that can be burnt far more efficiently in
homes, commercial properties and by industry to directly provide heat
(increasing effective utilisation of that resource by around 50%)

Efficiency is not the main issue.

Using it for electricity generation, particularly when it was
abundantly clear that the rate of consumption greatly exceeded the
rate of getting new sources into production was always going to be
very short sighted, but with no one keeping overall control, as long
as the revenues from the taxes associated with abstraction were
flowing no one really cared in government what the hell was going on,
I think the words commonly used by the clueless are "The market will
decide" Unfortunately that, combined with the short term export
market that made some people very rich is now coming back to bite us
in a big way.

I am in almost total agreement on that. But that sort of
shortsightedness is not the sole preserve of the thatcherites.

Calling gas "a better option" is always going to be an extremely
foolish statement as far as electricity generation is concerned
(unless of course you live in somewhere like Siberia, Algeria or
Libya)

I think you have missed the point. Gas is not a better option because it
is easier to burn efficiently. It is a better option because burning it
produced less CO2 than coal for the same energy output. AIUI natural gas
is basically methane - CH4 while coal is basically carbon -C alone.

I believe similar considerations apply to the comparison between petrol
and diesel. Diesel will produce 25% more CO2 than the same volume of
petrol. (Or is it that petrol will produce 25% less?)

--
Roger Chapman