In its new Future Energy Scenarios report, National Grid’s Electricity System Operator (ESO) maps three potential pathways to meet the UK’s 2050 net-zero target. Electric Engagement is weighted towards the electrification of sectors such as heating, transport & heavy industry. Hydrogen Evolution prioritises the use of hydrogen instead. Holistic Transition is a mix.
Renewables dominate across the board, with wind and solar at 150-250 GW by 2050, depending on the scenario. Total energy supply and demand is highest in the Hydrogen Evolution pathway. Electrifying sectors is seen as inherently more efficient than producing hydrogen, since doing so can be energy-intensive, using scarce green energy to make expensive fuel, or carbon-intensive fossil gas. Indeed, as Edie notes, though natural gas supply in the Hydrogen Evolution pathway is two-thirds lower in 2050 than at present, it is still over double the level in the Electric Engagement/Holistic Transitions. But in Holistic Transition, hydrogen is nevertheless used for hard-to-decarbonise sectors like heavy industrial manufacturing, though light road transport and building heating are mainly electric.
ESO says that it will be possible to get to zero net power before 2035, if Biomass with Carbon Capture and Storage (BECCS) is also used. They say all their new zero pathways ‘achieve a decarbonised power sector by 2035 at the latest. Holistic Transition & Electric Engagement achieve this in 2033 and 2034 respectively. This is driven by high levels of wind & solar uptake, reduced use of unabated gas & initial deployments of bioenergy with carbon capture & storage (BECCS).’ And ESO insist that ‘negative emissions with power BECCS from 2030 onwards are essential to achieving net zero power.’
Well maybe, but there are land-use and spatial issues related to growing biomass on a large scale and then storing the resultant carbon. And it’s yet to be proven commercially. One alternative, Direct Air Carbon Capture and Storage (DACCS), which also features in the ESO pathways, avoids biomass production, but as ESO says ‘DACCS is an energy-intensive process requiring both electricity and heat’. However it suggests that ‘the heat requirement can be supplied from waste heat sources, such as industrial waste heat. Alternatively, other DACCS technologies in development, such as electrochemical DACCS, work in a similar way to a fuel cell and do not require heat, therefore reducing overall energy demand.’ Still not convinced? Well they say ‘DACCS facilities can be operated flexibly and, if located in areas with high renewable supply and low demand, could play a role in managing network constraints and reducing balancing costs’.
Plenty of room for debate then- some see DACCS as an expensive way to enable continued use of fossil fuel. But there are also some areas of agreement. For example, ESO says that the Government has several ‘no-regrets’ actions that it can and should do now. They include increasing public spending on energy efficiency improvements, accelerating the uptake of electric heating & heat networks, and the deployment of energy storage infrastructure and also supporting innovation for flexible and smart technologies. Yes- all of that is vital. And Labour may pick some if it up in its new programme.
However, the ESO doesn’t see nuclear expanding very much until around 2040 and even on the Electric Engagement scenario it only reaches 151 TWh from 22GW by 2050 (less than the government’s target of 24GW), compared with 380 TWh for offshore wind. But not everyone sees it that way. The growth-orientated Sci-Tech lobby group UKDayOne is pushing for nuclear, and says ‘the Government should aim to have built or begun constructing 8-10 additional gigawatt-scale nuclear plants by 2040.’ It points to modelling by Carbon Free Europe (CFE) which it says suggests that ‘the most cost-effective path to net zero for the UK involves building 61GW of nuclear by 2050, due to reduced requirements for grid balancing’. That would certainly cut back on offshore wind. Or as CFE puts it ‘failure to reach this level of [nuclear] deployment will require building significantly more offshore wind & increase transition costs,’ adding that ‘a breakthrough in nuclear costs could unlock additional opportunities for nuclear applications’.
Well maybe so, but will that happen? No sign yet..with the £20bn Sizewell C plan still stalled and novel SMRs at best some way off. But CFE seems optimistic about nuclear, while being quite pessimistic about progress on the consumer demand management. Instead it portrays a 20-year delay in electrification in its ‘Slow Consumer Uptake Pathway’, with carbon capture and storage having to be ramped up to compensate- along of course with nuclear.
The UKDayOne study is even more pessimistic about the demand side and improved system flexibility - and it says ESO has got its consumer transformation projections badly wrong.
Who will turn out to be right? Will consumers continue to be passive, faced with opportunities to do something new? For example, the Labour Manifesto promised to ‘invite communities to come forward with projects, and work with local leaders and devolved governments to ensure local people benefit directly from this energy production.’ By 2030, optimistically, this may deliver up to 8GW of new cheap, clean local power. Not as much as is needed perhaps, but still worth having. Isn’t that a good way to go, with positive local green growth?
However, while local smaller-scale community based projects can have social and environmental benefits, there can also be economies of scale from large scale schemes . The CFE report admits that the UK has ‘over 1000 GW of offshore wind capacity potential, 40% of which can cost less than 109 euros (£95) per megawatt hour’, and that may be pessimistic. Some much lower levelised cost estimates have been quoted in official government reports for CfD-based renewable energy projects commissioning in 2025 - £44/MWh for offshore wind, £38/MWh for onshore wind and £41/MWh for large scale solar, all in 2021 prices, contrasting starkly with £109/MWh for new nuclear, based on the earlier inflation index-linked Hinkley CfD. So maybe ESO is right to play down nuclear. We will have to wait and see what the next CfD auction round (AR6) comes up with for new renewables projects and the results of the ongoing negotiations on new nuclear project funding.
The results of AR6 have been delayed by an appeal process, but they ought to emerge soon, although Ember has warned that, due to allocation budget limits, there may be a short-fall on offshore wind capacity. RenewableUK said over 10 GW of new offshore wind was eligible for bids in the next auction, but the currently agreed funding would only be enough for half this. And fortunately Miliband has now moved on it, pushing the total allocation up by £500m to £1.5bn- it is after all a flagship policy area. However, the new government may not be willing to also push ahead just now with a decision on Sizewell C. It is certainly interesting that the claim made by the last government that nuclear was a ‘sustainable and environmentally friendly energy generation solution’ has not yet been backed up by DESNZ research. It’s evidently still ‘work in progress’. Given also its high cost, and the governments money shortage, maybe it’s time for a U turn?
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