Скачать или смотреть When Scotland Made Its Own Gas

Behind the oldest house in Glasgow - Provand's Lordship - once sat one of the largest gasworks in Scotland, if not the UK.

Here in Scotland, and in the rest of the UK, we used to make our own gas. We didn't need to import gas from other countries, like Norway and Russia. We made our own gas, from coal, called town gas. We were self-sufficient.

These days, about 50% of the gas we use comes from abroad; from Norway mostly, but from other countries too, like Russia.

And you have to ask yourself the question: why are we reliant on other countries for something that is crucial to our survival?

Is Margaret Thatcher to blame? She privatised British Gas. And we now have the so-called Big Six energy firms, which is effectively a free-for-all; a privatised shambles with gas being bought and sold and men getting rich on the back of ordinary men and women who cannot afford to heat their homes.

Is this really progress?

This video looks at gas works in villages, gasworks in town and cities, and the development of a source of lighting and heating that has all but gone.

Certainly the infrastructure that allowed us to illuminate our streets, our homes, and cook our food has pretty much vanished. There are still a few gasholders around, these huge round things that went up and down depending on how much gas they stored, but this is a significant part of our industrial heritage that has fallen by the wayside.

Here in Scotland, we made our own gas.