Wait for the Blackout

Last week, Jess Ralston, the Head of Energy at the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit (ECIU), took to Twitter/X to criticise Robert Jenrick for suggesting that if Labour keep their promise to decarbonise the grid by 2030, then we will see power blackouts:

She suggested Jenrick’s fears were “scaremongering” and demanded some evidence. She’s right that assertions without evidence can be dismissed without evidence. So, time to look at the evidence.

Warnings of Blackouts

First, Robert Jenrick is hardly the first person to warn of blackouts. The boss of the National Grid warned in November 2022, that blackouts and power cuts could be imposed during a really cold winter. Last year the National Grid also warned that they “sometimes they need to reduce demand by planned outages to avoid major damage”.

If even the National Grid is warning of outages, then Jenrick’s comments can hardly be described as scaremongering.

Peak Supply from Fossil Fuels and Nuclear

Remember that Labour have promised to decarbonise the grid by 2030, so I thought it would be helpful to see how much we rely upon reliable sources of power like fossil fuels and nuclear power now. I downloaded the supply and demand figures from Gridwatch for December 2023 and January 2024 to determine the peak supply from fossil fuel sources and from nuclear power during that period. There were eight occasions when supply from these sources exceeded 32GW. The peak supply from fossil fuels and nuclear came during the evening of December 1st, 2023, at 32.3GW. At that time, we were getting <1.5GW from wind, nothing from solar, 2.8GW from biomass, 0.8GW from hydro and a net 5.8GW from interconnectors.

Since then, due to a fault on one of the nuclear power stations supply from nuclear has dropped from 4.8GW to 3.8GW.

Changes to Generating Capacity

Over the next few years, the supply from fossil fuel and nuclear sources is going to change dramatically. First, the Government has announced that it plans to phase out our remaining coal power stations by October 2024. Moreover, the Hartlepool and Heysham One nuclear power plants are scheduled to shut down in 2026. In addition, the remaining two Advanced Gas Cooled Reactors at Heysham Two and Torness and due to shut down in 2028. This will leave us with just 1.2GW of nuclear capacity until Hinkley C eventually comes online, now expected in 2031.

DUKES Table 5.11 gives a list of all power stations in the U.K. by type, including the year of installation. Gas-fired power stations are supposed to have a life of 25-30 years (sometimes up to 40 years). Assuming an asset life of 30 years for gas-fired units and the announcements about coal generation and the nuclear power plants, Figure 2 shows what the profile of fossil fuel and nuclear power plant capacity looks like out to 2035 and compares that to the peak power produced by these types of unit in December 2023.

Here we can see we may run into trouble as soon as late this year if there are any unplanned outages or maintenance issues with the power plants. Capacity in 2025 just falls short of peak requirement, with 2026 showing a capacity gap of 3.9GW. The gap then grows to 15.9GW in 2030, closes a bit in 2031 as Hinkley C comes online before expanding to over 17GW by 2035. This does not consider that as the penetration of EVs and heat pumps increases, peak demand is likely to rise, further exacerbating the gap.

It might be possible to extend the life of these power plants out to 40 years. This begs the question about whether we should be basing our energy security on aging gas-fired power plants that are on their last legs? Ignoring that issue for the moment, extending the lives has the impact of keeping us just above water out to 2027, but there is a 1.4GW gap from 2028 as the remaining AGR nuclear plants close. If the grid is supposed to be decarbonised by 2030, there is then a gaping chasm of over 31GW at that point, as seen in Figure 3.

So, what might fill the gaps? Well, the most obvious thing to do would be to keep the coal-fired plants running and nurse the gas-fired plants into a longer life. To be safe, we should be investing in more new gas-fired plants, but we have not installed a new CCGT plant since 2016.

During those peak times described above, the interconnectors were effectively maxed out already, so there is no chance they can come to the rescue.

The Net Zero zealots have ruled out fossil fuels, so let us look at renewables. We have 1.5GW of natural flow hydroelectric capacity and aside from a few single-digit MW installations, we have not installed any significant new capacity since 2008. Hydro is not coming to the rescue. We also have pumped hydro, designed for fast response, but much of this was already being used at the times of peak demand, so that is not going to bridge the gap either.

We have 3.9GW of bioenergy, most of it being burning trees at Drax. There is no chance of expanding that to meet a 31GW supply gap by 2030, and anyway, where would all the wood-chips come from?

Of course, if we carpeted more farmland with solar panels, it would make no difference at all. This is because the peaks occur when it is dark, so there is no solar power anyway.

That leaves wind. At the times when fossil fuels and nuclear were providing over 32GW, wind was producing 1-1.5GW. It is unrealistic to expect that we can double wind capacity by 2030, but even if we could, we might expect at most an extra 1.5GW of generation on calm cold evenings, or less than 5% of the gap. So even doubling wind capacity is not going to help.

They could retrofit carbon capture and storage (CCS) on to the existing gas-fired plants, but there are several issues with this. First, we do not have a single plant working with this technology today, so the chances of installing this on all the aging gas-fired plants by 2030 are negligible. Second, CCS reduces the efficiency of power plants, so even if they did manage to install CCS, the output would be ~20% lower than it is today, meaning we would still have a significant generation gap.

Conclusions

Robert Jenrick was right. The evidence shows if Labour gets in and pursues decarbonising the grid by 2030, then we are in for blackouts. But before he takes a victory lap, he should consider that his party’s plans call for decarbonisation of the grid by 2035. Under his Government’s plans we will still face blackouts by 2028 at the latest.

I do hope this is sufficient evidence to convince Jess Ralston that our generation capacity is in a parlous state and there is a very real risk we will face blackouts in the not-so-distant future. And while we are on the subject of needing evidence to support assertions, what is the evidence that the “I” in ECIU can justifiably stand for Intelligence?

The inspiration for the title of this article came from the eponymous song by, appropriately enough, The Damned. When thinking about alleged policy gurus, recent, current and potential future energy secretaries, I am reminded of another track from the punk era: Pretty Vacant.

David Turver writes the Eigen Values Substack page, where this article first appeared.