The UK is among the world’s leading countries in terms of wind energy development. According to the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA), the total capacity of onshore and offshore wind turbines in the UK more than doubled between 2014 and 2023 (from 13.1 GW to 30.2 GW), with their share in the energy mix rising from 9% to 29%.
A number of major projects have been implemented in Scotland over the years, including the Seagreen wind farm based 27 km off the coast of Angus, which has 114 wind turbines with a total capacity of 1.1 GW, and the 443 MW Viking wind farm, which was brought into operation in the Shetland Islands this year. Although the two wind farms have enough capacity to supply more than 2 million households, both were suspended this autumn.
While the launch of new capacities usually requires infrastructure modernization, the British grid complex proved unprepared for the large-scale introduction of renewable energy projects.
The UK government had to buy the previously privatized National Energy System Operator (NESO, formerly National Grid) to coordinate the connection of new renewable facilities to the grid.
However, the problem of lagging construction for new power transmission lines is a global one. According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), global investment in RES development rose by more than 70% from 2019 to 2023 (from $424 billion to $735 billion per year), whereas capital expenditure on the construction of substations and transmission lines only increased by 20% (from $310 billion to $374 billion per year).
Another problem is the dependence of RES on weather conditions. This dependence is usually viewed in terms of energy supply risks during windless and cloudy weather. However, excess generation during the hours of low demand also incurs considerable costs. Construction of storage systems could be a solution, but their use is not yet widespread. According to the Energy Institute, the installed capacity of energy storage systems in the UK totaled less than 1 GW in 2019 and reached only 3.6 GW by the end of 2023 (with the aggregate RES capacity of 55.6 GW).
Another solution could be the construction of electrolyzers which could help in redirecting excess electricity towards hydrogen production. However, the infrastructure of green hydrogen is still in its infancy. For instance, the total capacity of electrolyzers across Europe was almost 30% lower in 2023 than that of blue hydrogen production facilities (31.6 million tons per year versus 44.1 million tons per year).
