BRITAIN could face widespread electricity blackouts unless there was urgent investment in a new fleet of gas-fired power stations, say MPs.
With almost a quarter of the country's current generating capacity due to be decommissioned by 2016, the Commons Environmental Audit Committee said there was not time to wait for a new generation of nuclear power stations.
The committee also said the need to cut damaging greenhouse gas emissions meant the era of cheap energy was coming to an end as old fossil fuels were replaced by cleaner technologies.
The Government's energy review, due this year, is widely expected to recommend a return to nuclear power generation, in what the committee said would be a major U-turn in policy.
But the committee said that with the first of any new nuclear plants not coming on stream until 2017 at the earliest - and the full generating capacity of such a programme possibly not being available until 2030 - the country would still face a `generating gap'.
It added: "Over the next nine years very substantial investment in new generating capacity and energy efficiency will be required."
The shortfall would have to be met by new gas-fired power stations, supplemented by renewable energy.
