Energy news in general

Scot_39

The old NGESO £3bn by 29/30 iirc , the new NESO £3.x bn by i think peak may have slipped to 2030/1 but id have to lookmagain - is purely grid thermal capacity constraint. Part of a total balancing cost of £8bn at time.

Putting nearly 50% of renewables Wind Power in Scotland - then realising you have to actually get the power delivered to markets 100s of miles away - and building that afterwards costs us all.

Not awarding the contracts for in one case reportedly 2 years of Ofgem negotiations - reportedly added over £1bn in costs from suppliers original costings (scope or inflation share ??) and that on a 5 yr delivery timescale. During which period - so arguably 7 years - curtailment payments could be in play for existing farms let alone new pending (**).

Both egl1 and 2 are now c2029 delivery. Their combined £6bn cost (2024 rates) for c4GW capacity if delayed worth another £400m plus on that £3 bn in 2030 according to older 2024 report NGESO figures. Not sure NESO gave the equiv figure in their 2025 powerpoint style report I saw the £3.x bn on chart..

(*) Seagreen the largest wind farm in Scotland as of 2024 - c1.07GW theoretical - went straight to the top of curtailment payment tables - as no local demand for its power. Getting about 40% of 2024 total £s some quarters for 1/15th total Scottish wind capacity - as is operating at around 70% curtailed. Worse still to add insult to injury, part owned by SSE, the local TNO grid operator.

Ofgem announced in Dec they are trying to bring 3 more hvdc forward - including 2 more Scotland South - egl3 and 4 - but unlike thd £108 extra network costs announced the week before - have yet to tell us the annual net cost of building them on our bills.

Those grid and curtailment coste meaning CfD prices - even when were cheaper - ar7 sold offshore at a premium about 30% at 2025 indexed price above Ofgem price tracking graphs at time - simply arent transfering into cheaper prices on our bills - because you guessed it - we have to pay the 3 TNOs there even pre 95% by 2030 - 5 year cycle plan upto c£15bn pa (£55-77bn over 5 years) - to expand the grid.

(**) Oversupply gets complicated as it depends on which generation of CfD contract or pre CfD terms renewables licensed / contracted on. As some - have a 6hr generation vs demand over supply protection added - later reduced to 1 hr protection - cannot remember exact rounds - 2 and 4 maybe - id have to check.

Chrysalis

These issues seem down to poor planning, it needs local power demand as I assume the grid wasnt brought up to scratch first, so couldnt be transmitted everywhere, and there should be battery storage for all the excess which can then get used when is no wind.

This isnt a renewables technology problems, its a planning and infrastructure problem.

Curtailment is a side affect of getting private sector to build, the state can eat any downtime, it doesnt have the need to satisfy shareholders, but the private sector has ROI targets to meet. But at least if the planning was done properly curtailment % would be minimised.

Qyburn

Transmission network capacity does even get mentioned in the planning process. Sometimes a bit of flannel about the local connection (local could be 10 miles plus). Generally the developer tries to wash their hands even of this, saying it's outside their control.

QrizB

Helpfully, the five biggest wind farms listed by Robin Hawkes on his Renewables Map are all on England or Wales (or at least, offshore of England and Wales and connected to them) so they'll avoid the Scotland-to-England bottleneck.

Between them they're about 6.4GW of nominal capacity.

(They're not all fully commissioned yet but are getting there.)

Martyn1981

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82046265#Comment_82046265

Yep. And the last CfD auction for offshore wind approved 6.87GW off the English and Welsh coasts, and 1.4GW off the Scottish coast, roughly in line with the current UK total being about 20-25% off the Scottish coast.

Sadly, the effective 2015 ban (by planning rule changes) on onshore wind in England meant that whilst Scotland raced ahead with deployments, England saw very little. Thankfully said ban was lifted in 2024, but still a lost decade. Plus of course Scotland is far better suited to onshore wind than England (more open land, higher wind speeds, well established sector and greater public support).

Again, looking at the last CfD auction, we see 1.1GW of onshore wind approvals (approx 85%) for Scotland. But naturally, PV works a bit better in England (and Wales) where 4.57GW (approx 93%) of approved deployments lie.

QrizB

Not sure quite where to post this but here will do.

This evening there was an Octopus Saving Session that paid 51p/kWh (£510/MWh) of you reduced your electricity use and (where possible) increased your export between 1930-2030.

Per this social media post from Robin Hawkes, during that period the grid was short of power and was buying electricity from Europe at £1000/MWh (£1/kWh). We were also paying up to £360/MWh for gas and battery storage plants to turn their output up.

Meanwhile we also had to curtail 1.5GW of Scottish wind generation due to a shortage of grid capacity. That's 1.5GW of power we wouldn't have needed to buy if the grid had been built out to match.

Netexporter

I wonder who it was that decided to ban onshore wind in England, encourage offshore in Scotland but neglected to provide the means to transmit the energy to where it is most needed?

QrizB

I wonder who it was …

Might it be the same people who proudly announced they would "cut all the green carp"?

Per that analysis I've linked, it cost households £5bn in 2023 alone. And we're still paying now.

JKenH

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82046877#Comment_82046877

Yet at 9pm this evening Agile rates in North Scotland were (I believe) the highest in the country at 92.5p/kWh.

Scot_39

Or 1.5 GW of wind power we wouldn't have to have built - certainly not in such a poor location in terms of access - so chances are paid curtailment on/off for most of its lifetime - then having to spend part of the £6.3bn on current EGLs to connect to (with 2 more planned) - if we hadn't shut down our coal generation prematurely - or built more nuclear when warned - from the 90s and 00s onwards.

UK last coal plant 2024 - Germany current plan - last plant c2037/8 - same Paris 2015 agreement and subsequent - same 2050 net zero target.

And reports now suggesting German even re-looking at extending 5 major plant lifespans - ones that burn dirty lignite coal.

Why - well 2 obvious major reasons

lignite a fuel Germany is self sufficient in

it has a govt that cares about the current energy costs for its population - and its far larger industrial base - having suffered severely in recent past from imports being blocked.

Its not that Germany isn't into renewables or green hydrogen development.

Whilst like the UK, Germany has to import far too much of its gas and oil - it was far more dependent so suffered more than most from the loss of Russian gas supply.

But unlike the UK - it has a lot less being left untapped under the North Sea it could actually benefit from.

Whilst the UK leaves new fields untapped, Norway opening its fields in N Sea at speed - and guess what - yes we import it from them. Our biggest natural gas supplier by miles..