According to the UK Independence Party website UKIP will try to achieve the following if they gain power at the 2010 general election:
16.1 Our future depends substantially on our new technology. UKIP would therefore support UK research and development in science, technology and engineering generously through the research grants system, particularly to our world-leading universities and colleges, and by ensuring that the regulatory and tax framework assists UK companies in cooperating and competing globally.
16.2 With regard to vital nuclear power, the present Government has recently forced the sale by BNFL of nuclear design capacity, and of Britain’s share of the URENCO gascentrifuge process. We would ensure that the UK retains and strengthens what nuclear design and construction capability remains, with involvement in international collaborations where this is appropriate, including cooperation within the Commonwealth.
16.3 As we reinvigorate the nuclear industry in this country, we are likely to find that we are short of expertise. Our existing universities can provide high-quality graduate technologists and engineers in sufficient numbers, but there will be a substantial shortfall in the supply of technicians. This would require us to address defects at various points in the education system incorporating apprenticeships ( to be addressed in an updated policy statement on education ).
16.4 We would also encourage research and development activity to exploit diverse renewable energy sources. Whilst we recognise that it is not yet possible to identify those technologies certain to be of long-term benefit, some examples of potentially important new or established technologies that we would wish to encourage are: solar heating; electricity generation using solar or thermophotovoltaic (TPV) cells; tidal power; power-generating buoys to harness wave energy; hydro-electric power; geothermal energy; extracting methane from sewage and landfill; the conversion of coal into methane underground; crops that can be converted directly into diesel, alcohol, or new high energy fuels such as 2,5-dimethylfuran (DMF), used for space heating or fuelling electricity generation; solid state lighting technology; production of ‘bioplastics’ from plant material; production of fuels from bio-waste; ‘microgeneration’ and the development of local distributed power and heat schemes.
I would be interested to hear both positive and negative views on UK Independence Party’s Energy Research, Development and Training policies in the comments below?