Introducing… Shockwave: how energy crises shaped the UK economy

When Donald Trump attacked Iran in February this year, and Iran retaliated by closing the Strait of Hormuz, it sent shockwaves through the global economy. Fossil fuels from the Gulf couldn’t be shipped out. Oil and gas prices shot up.

And now our energy bills are rising again. The first ripples of the conflict have begun washing up on the shores of the UK economy – while we’ve barely recovered from the cost-of-living crisis caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

But this isn’t the first energy crisis the UK’s experienced, nor the second nor the third. For the last hundred years, our history has been repeatedly punctuated by crises, from the blistering cold winter of 1947 to the Suez crisis of 1956 and the three-day week of the 1970s.

So, is there a thread connecting these events? Why has the UK repeatedly failed to build a resilient energy system? And what do we need to do to make sure the lights don’t go out in future?

I wanted to dig into these questions on Shockwave: a miniseries from the New Economics Podcast which asks: how have energy crises have shaped our economy, and what do we need to do to shockproof our energy system for an increasingly volatile world?

I’ll be joined by New Economics Foundation economists Dr Alex Chapman and Jaya Sood, and writer and academic Gareth Fearn, to find the answers to my questions.

Tune in to the first episode and subscribe on all good podcast apps, so you never miss an episode. And follow the podcast on Instagram and TikTok at @neweconomicspod.

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