New wind and nuclear power will be “wasted” unless the electrical grid has enough capacity to transmit them, the government has been told.
The Department for Energy Security and Net Zero said on Friday that it welcomes the report submitted by Electricity Networks Commissioner Nick Winser on how the UK can halve the time needed to build transmission infrastructure, which currently takes around 12 to 14 years.
The report’s recommendations include strategic planning and more efficient time management, as well as better design and lump-sum compensation to reduce local opposition.
However, because wind and solar farms are often smaller, the national grid would have to pull lots of smaller cables to many different power generation sites across the country, rather than enormous cables to few big coal plants.
In his letter to Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero Grant Shapps, Mr. Winser said if the grid isn’t upgraded at the same pace as home-grown energy, not only the power will be “standing idle,” customers will also face “very high” congestion costs.
Because a given piece of electricity transmission equipment can only carry a certain amount of power before it becomes overheated, the National Grid Electricity System Operator (ESO) acts like an electricity traffic police by giving some energy generators “constraints payment” so they reduce output.
The method is also meant to be used to reduce the size of household bills. For instance, when it’s “very windy,” the ESO can pay some gas power generator to turn down their output to give way to a wind farm because it would be cheaper, but it can’t do that if the wind farm is not plugged into the part of the grid that’s connected to where energy is needed.
Lengthy Process to Deliver Infrastructure
It currently takes almost 14 years for an infrastructure project to be completed, the report says. The process includes more than a year for initial assessment and proposal, two years for picking and designing the routes, and almost seven years to gain land rights, local consent, and regulatory and planning approval. Another four years are then needed for construction.Manufacturers of specialised equipment are also building up backlogs as many countries are in the process of decarbonising their electric grids.
The commissioner also said that the lack of “agreed and public guidance” have slowed down the approval process because developers are forced to evidence and argue “every aspect” of a project “from scratch.”
The commissioner made 19 recommendations, including accelerating the establishment of a Future System Operator so it can draw up a Strategic Spatial Energy Plan, assess the energy markets, and coordinate the works in Scotland and England and Wales.
He also suggested different aspects of a project can run concurrently instead of one after another, with the view of compressing the overall time to seven years.
“I believe that we must ... reduce the overall timescale to seven years. I am confident that this is achievable,” he said in his letter to Mr. Shapps.
To reduce local opposition, the commissioner recommended better visual design so they are more acceptable to citizens and communities.
He also recommended a lump sum payment for residents who live near overhead lines or other visible infrastructure because they are much cheaper than underground or offshore lines.
Mr. Shapps welcomed the “package of detailed recommendations.”
In his letter the Mr. Winser, the minister said the government will give the recommendations “full consideration,” adding, “I can be clear now that the direction of the package is broadly in line with the approach being taken by government.”
PA Media contributed to this report.
