British Energy - More unplanned Power outages - Credit down rating - more UK energy security problems

The post of Friday, August 17, 2007 -British Energy Nuclear Fleet production down 17%, profits by 14% covered the BE Q1 2007/08 results ending 1st July - BE once produced some 20% of the UK base electricity output - the results showed an astonishing (unplanned) reduction of total output dropped 17% from 17TWh to 14TWh for the period.

Now we learn today that Standard & Poor's Ratings Services have placed its 'BB+' long-term corporate credit rating British Energy Group PLC and its subsidiary British Energy Holdings PLC (BEH) on CreditWatch with negative implications.

The 'BB' issue rating on BEH's GBP550 million senior unsecured bonds was also placed on CreditWatch with negative implications.

This results from the previous day's announcement of problems in a boiler closure unit at one of the two reactors at Hartlepool which led the company to take the precaution of shutting down the other reactor and another of its units at Heysham, south of Morecambe.

The problem found during a statutory outage at Hartlepool's first reactor relates to a wire winding. The discovery will delay the restart of the unit, which was originally scheduled for early November.

The second reactor at Heysham 1 is currently on a refuelling outage but its return to service will be delayed. British Energy said it was currently assessing when the units might return to service.

There are eight steel and concrete boiler closure units in each reactor. All are pre-stressed with nine layers of wire winding at the outer periphery. Hinkley Point B and Hunterston B returned to service in May but output is still being affected by load restrictions.

These windings are somewhat like alternate armature windings on an electric motor. They areactually massive steel ropes designed purely to contain any explosion - they only get really tested when things go very badly wrong. Engineers who worked on them originally faced enormous problems, as the 3 dimensional geometry whilst ideal in purpose, presented huge problems is construction and they were subject to massive forces to get them in place.

The concern expressed and the rapid closure of Heysham suggests that there could be a major problem and prolonged outages... another consequence of the rash of one off designs used in the 60's designed reactors.

The shares dropped 40p on the news and trade at 540p off 2 year highs of 700p.

Do not discount a merger with DRAX. (lse DRX) whose shares have risen from 610 when this news was announced to nearly 650p. Drax, as the next largest UK electricity supplier will benefit as electricity wholesale prices rise resulting from BE's shortage of output and their need to buy in onthe market to meet sales contract requirments.

This is not good news for any plans the Gubment have for reintroducing nuclear power as part of the UK power mix ... another consequence of their delay and procrastination.

Northern Rock - BOE Borrowings now exceed £25 Bn. and rising - Is there an alternative to calling in the administrators ?

The funding of Northern Rock becomes even more bizarre as Simon Ward, of New Star Asset Management in London,has examined the Bank Book at the BOE and concluded that borrowings by Northern Wreck W/E October 24th exceed 21 Bn. Pounds... and the rate of borrowing is accelerating ..£4.7 BN this last week compared with £3 Bn. last week. (You can probably add another £4 Bn at least this week so the ttal today is probably £25 Mn.!!!)

The shares mystically stay supported at 180-odd pence (ish) as bottom feeders JC Flowers claim they are nearer a buyout claiming a line up of heavyweights - Richard Pym 58,former head of Alliance & Leicester Plc, and Chairman of Halfords plc, as prospective CEO (see pic) , Paul Myners 59 , a former chairman of Marks & Spencer Group Plc, as chairman -he was voted public company non-executive director of the year by readers of Sunday Times in 2006. Hugh Scott-Barrett, former CFO of ABN Amro Holding NV, to take the same position . Bob Bennett, the former CFO of Northern Rock, Peter Birch, former CEO of Abbey National Plc, and Martin Jacomb, former chairman of Prudential Plc, have also been asked to advise the buyout firm, J.C. Flowers said yesterday.

Northern Rock plc is also being advised by the Credit Suisse Group and JP Morgan Cazenove.

The problem is that the retail lenders have fled and are continuing to flee, (a City guesstimate £5bn outflow of savings is probably underestimate says Simon Ward) borrowers cannot be forced to pay more yet borrowing costs (not to mention the horrendous legal / advisory fees the City will be milking) now exceed potential income.

Surely there can be no other route than administration and an effective nationalisation and run-off of the mortgage book. Continued support by the Government of the Board is absurd if not criminal.

Speaking earlier this week to MPs at a hearing of the Treasury Select Committee, Alastair Darling said there were lessons to be learned from the banking fiasco. He added that Northern Rock could have handled the situation better. "There are certainly great lessons to be learned from the interface of the Bank of England and FSA," he said. "There needs to be clarification between the two bodies about their roles. Clearly there is some overlap between the two."

...and this is the clever structure that the twat who is now Minister of Education, Mr Ed Balls constructed. It failed at the first jump.

The first lesson to learn is to sack the whole Board, call in the Administrators, refund the retail lenders immediately and face the folks who funded Granite and all the other specious SIV's with their criminal schemes which all hung on a slemder leagl thread that the structure was determined to benefit a charity - the The Down's Syndrome North east who were unaware of their part in this whole fraud.

PS : Richard Pym when at the A & L shared the dubious distinction of (with surprisingly) Northern Rock of having the highest "redemption fee" of £295 for moving your mortgage... so he is not unused to chiselling the customer.

Is there an alternative to calling in the administrators ?

In one word - Absolutely fucking not.

PS Sir John Gieve (happily refreshed from his holidays whilst the ordure hit the air conditioning) has ben unaccountably silent as the Director responsible for Market Stability.Sir John readers will recall left the Home Office accounts in such a state that the Government Auditor refused to pass them.... he also let Sir Ian Blair spend a weekend fending off the IPCC collecting evidence of the nurder of Charles de Menezes.

Pfizers Exubera bombs and boosts Lilly prospects, but Prasrugel uncertainty sees Lilly have biggest one day fall for 4 years

Eli Lilly stockholders, Directors amd employees would relish a boner without using longer lasting Cialis, on the news last week that Pfizer have junked their inhaled insuling delivery system Exubera (2007 sales US$12 Mn against projected US$2 Bn.) and taken a US$2.8 Bn. hit on the Balance sheet.Ouch!!!! They will return the rights for marketing to Nektar.See post March 28th Pfizer's Exubera inhaled insulin another dog for Pfizer

Today Pfizer announced 60 jobs to go during 2008 of the 3000 at Portage their largest pharmaceutical manufacturing operation in North America related to this decision.

San Carlos based Nektar Therapeutics Inc.,(NASDAQ: NKTR) who developed the product have announced today they are looking for a new partner.

Of all Nektar's total revenue of US$150.9 million through Q1 and Q2Pfizer was responsible for US$108Mn leaving a loss of US$53 Mn.for the 2 Qtrs.

Lilly have however seen their share price take a dive as uncertainty prevails over the expected announcement on November 4th about a heart pill, Prasrugel, it has licensed from Daiichi Sankyo. Set to challenge Plavix ( US$6 Bn. annual sales) marketed by Sanofi-Aventis (nyse: SNY ) and Bristol-Myers Squibb (nyse: BMY ), prevents the blood from clotting. Blood clots that form in the arteries around gunked-up plaque are the major cause of heart attacks and strokes.

The results of a Harvard medical School study of 14,000-patient study will be presented next week at the annual meeting of the American Heart Association in Orlando which it is hoped (and intended) will impress the FDA.

Prasrugel is theoretically superior to Plavix because it is said to work on the thrid of pateinets that don't respond to Plavix due to them being genetically determined to be unable to metabolise Plavix into it's active constituent.

However on Wednesday night (after the market closed) Lilly issued a press release under pressure from the Wall Street Journal saying it had stopped giving patients medicine in two small studies while it considers adjusting the dose - "after data raised concerns about the dosage used in certain patient groups. " Lilly provided little information but studies are generally suspended because of side effects and other problems.

A consequence has been that the spin meisters of Wall Street have fluttered their feathers and Oppenheimer and Morgan Stanley downgraded Eli Lilly shares,Goldman Sachs kept its "buy" rating but took Lilly off a list of preferred stocks. An analysts at Deutsche Bank has consulted the chicken entrails end believes that prasugrel is excreted through the kidneys which may lead to bleeding in patients with kidney problems.(Deutsche owns at least one percent of LLY shares, makes a market in the stock and has done and wants to do more investment banking for the company).

Lilly closed Thursday down 7.7% at US452.43 its worst one-day loss in 4 years the biggest one-day fall since Oct. 23, 2002--almost five years to the day.

Northern Rock - rat leaves sinking ship

NORTHERN 2 VCT PLC
Director declaration
Pursuant to Listing Rule 9.6.14, Northern 2 VCT PLC ('the Company') announces
that Dr Matt Ridley, the non-executive chairman of the Company, resigned as a
non-executive director of Northern Rock (LSE: NRK.L - news) plc with effect from Monday 22 October
2007.
END

...which will probably save him from being charged with issuing fraudulent accounts and running a company whilst insolvent.

Israel - Pig sty ?

Established 4 years ago Zalul, is a non-profit and totally privately funded organization for the environment and conservation of the Red Sea, and now takes in projects to protect the seas and rivers of Israel.

Their website (in Israeli) detauils their work in exposing the problems of the Tel Abviv beaches and the Gershon river.

This was brought to mind when our favourite war criminal Tzipi Livni was berating poor old President Lykushenko of Byelorussia for calling a jewish village in hiscountry as a "pigsty" - a viallge which had sent 20,000 to the holocaust.

A recent UN report showed that Israel was one of the ten most polluted areas of the Mediterranean.Over half of the wastewater entering the Mediterranean Sea is untreated and they estimate that it will cost US$56 Mn. to deal with this problem alone. Zalul in their 2007 report " The State of the Sea" idebntify the official issuing ofover 100 permits allowing the discharge of 140 tons of heavy metals (Ca,Cr,Pb) 130 tons of pesticide residues, 5 tons of arsenic, 1,300 tons of ammonia and a ton of cyanide.

As if this is not enough the River Gershon is fed with untreated astes from the petrochemical and pharma industries.

Perhaps the biggest poluution is due to the Dan region Association of Towns for Treatment of sewage and Environmental issues that re-cycle water but discharge 4% as "sludge" in outfall pipes at sea, making Tel Aviv beaches unsafe for bathers.(Beware the Tel Baruch beach and parking lot - hookers on the prowl day and night)

Plans are afoot for treating the sludge with calcine to produce building blocks and one hare brained scheme by Biopetrol wants to turn the sludge into bio-fuel. This is what their website says.http://www.bio-petrol.com/

Pyrolysis and gasification offer more scope for recovering products from sewage sludge than incineration. When sludge is burnt in a modern incineration the only practical product is energy, whereas the gases, oils and solid char from pyrolysis and gasification can not only be used as fuel, but also purified and used as a feedstock for petrochemicals and other applications. Obviously, there is a growing demand for sludge management technologies capable of: 1). Meeting increasingly stringent regulatory requirements. 2.) Effectively utilizing potential for material and/or energy recovery.

Which sounds desperately like a scam, despite the august qualifications of it's supporters.

The picture is a reminder that a turd is not the only dangerous thing on a beach - a family were shelled on the beach in Gaza by the Israeli military shortly after they left on June 9th 2006 killing 9 including one whole family of 8 .

Cyprus - a leaky hole for refugees seeking asylum in the EU

Christos Patsalides , Interior Minister of Cyprus claims that Cyprus has the largest asylum seeker population per capita in the whole of the EU.

The Turkish Cypriot paper Afrika says that since Cyprus joined the EU in 2004, 12,000 illegal immigrants have arrived in the North. Last Saturday it was announced that another 45 had been smuggled trhough the North over the Green Line into Cyprus.

Most immigrants are from Syria, Iraq and Palestine, but destroy their papers once they have reached the island.

On Thursday there was a demonstration outside Xylotympou roundabout in the British sovereign base area of Dhekelia,( a historically important forum for protest - the UK forces helpfully provide Portaloos) which Cypriot Police kept citizens away from. Photography is illegal on the base area.

Now with the commencement of the ferry from Latakia to Famagusta many more refugees are expected.

Gangs, a mixture of Russian, East European and Turkish criminals more used to trafficking prostitutes to staff the bars and brothels of Aphrodite's Island have been exploiting a curious legal loophole in what is alleged to be a very profityable business. Once the immigrant reaches the Green Line (having piad the gangs thousands) the UN cannot interfere as the boundary is not a recognised International Boundary. Once in Cyprus they cannot be returned to a region which has a Government which is not recognised by anyone. On top of this the UK Sovereign base area is actually UK territory and the cause of the protests on Thursday was immigrants / refulgees demanding UK citizenship, and (hopefully) shipment to the UK.

To mucky murky waters still further the UK sovereign base has had refugees housed in "temporary housing " since the American / Turkish invasion from the North so recent immigrants can claim precedence of treatment.

The Syrians who have seen 2 million refugees flee Iraq in the past 4 years are of course happy to see them move on. As Latakia and the coastal area is the fiefdom of the Alawhite ruling claon of the Assads such wholesale smuggling cannot be operating without some degree of official sanction.

The ferry service between Latakia and Famagusta is said by the Syrians to encourage tourism.

Cyprus remains the last of the 10 accession states in 2004 to sign the Schengen agreement, which would allow free movement of EU nationals without the need for passports.

Rachida Dati seen by a billion on TV with President

Show me a girl with patent red leather high heels and I will show you a racing certainty", Chris Bernard once said, so the sight of Rachida Dati , Minister of Justice and Nicolas Sarkozy's mistress du jour in her trademark high heels and scarlet scarf at the Stades du France on Saturday confirmed that she is still as addicted to her favourite colour as ever.

Although when her "rise horizontale" started under the wing of Arnaud Lagardere whose media empire (Lagardere Active Media LAM ) includes Paris Match - and Elle, Europe 1 TV, and the Journal du Dimanche hleped finance his frequent visits to the French Turf she did for a while (as Lord Patel can attest) unclothe herself in the pink and grey racing colours of the Lagardere stable from a becoming little lingeriste just of the Rue de Fauborg St.Honore.

Therefore vision mixers at ITV must have been delighted when they could squeeze in the ravishing features of the 41 year old beautiful divorcee (and once the top selling Avon rep in Burgundy) when showing the beaming South African President , Thabo Mbeki in the Diplomatic boxes at the World Cup Final on Saturday.

It was of course Arnaud's Paris Match which was exposed (Lord Patel post here) as having removed the pint sized President's "love handles" or poignees d'amour which L'Express exposed as a heavily photoshopped images from the Dati / Sarkozy holiday at a at a luxury resort in Wolfeboro, New Hampshire this summer.

Rachida (known to the President as "Roc" ,a diminutive lovers name contracted from la Marocaine) tells me that he is peculiarly sensitive to his poignees d'amour and gets pissed off when she teases him about them. They are she says essential for when "le Jockey" (as he is known to her) becomes passionate he is as they say at Longchamps, liable to "dismount" - Toni Fabuloso has an alternative and rather coarse expression from the world of horse racers which discloses more knowledge of equine anatomy and physiology than she should have or we are willing to disclose.

Rachida also disclosed recently to us that her predescessor in the Ministry of Justice had been a great help in her career. Albin Chalandon was France's justice minister under Jacques Chirac when Dati approached him (he was then 66) at an Algerian embassy party in 1986 and asked for help. He ws ablwe to oblige and got her a job as an accountant at the oil giant ELF-Acquitaine where he had been in charge from 1977 to 1983... and he was there at the ceremony when she was sworn into office earlier this year.

Meanwhile the ex Mrs Sarkozy, Cecilia ,will soon be publishing a book , "Why I divorced the President", she tells us.

Charles de Menezes - Criminal mastermind who led gang of shoplifters ?

'Drew(that's short for Andrew) who used to work in a men's outitters on Oxford Street Identified Charles de Menezes today on CCTV from film taken shortly after he left the shop.

Asked if he identified de Menezes he said that he remebered the short, dark, curly haired man carrying the jacket to the till and paying for his purchases.

Asked how he knew it was de Menezes , 'Drew told the court that when the Police asked him to view the film 6 weeks ago he was certain it was him. "It was definitely him, because the the copper with him jumped up and said, "There he is the the thieving lying, fucking Paki bastard".

Asked how he knew he was leader of a gang of shoplifters who had been plaguing Oxford Street, he said it was obvious, buying things "on the straight" was a well known method of concealing their criminality.

He had learnt that when he was in Woodham Ferrars Youth Prison and palled up with a Paki.

PC Peter Clarke when further questioned admitted that when the witness had seen Menezes he did "confirm" the identity of the subject.He couldn't remember having described in the way the witness had..."but it was all a long time ago".