Weathering the grid

We all know that Britian is a country pre-occupied by weather and last month was no exception.  The dull start to November coupled with an unusually prolonged cold spell in the middle of the month gave Britons plenty to talk about as indeed has last week’s brief return to mild weather or Storm Darragh, which hit the UK over the weekend. 

Weather affects our economy, our transport systems, our agriculture, our lifestyles and it also has a profound effect on where we as a country get our electricity from.  On Monday 18th November, and for much of that week, gas powered the country peaking at over 54% of total generation.  Contrast that to Monday last week, 2nd December, and it was down at 30% with much of our power coming from wind.  The variability of Britain’s climate illustrates the need for a flexible electricity system to keep the country’s lights on.

The source of electricity also fundamentally affects the carbon intensity of the grid.  Going back to the 18th November, during the evening peak I clocked the grid running at high levels of carbon intensity with 242g of carbon dioxide being emitted for every kilowatt hour of electricity generated. I say this because a little over two weeks before the National Energy Systems Operator (NESO) published its report on how the UK can achieve a clean power system by 2030.

The NESO’s report describes two pathways that would see the UK become a net exporter of power and reduce unabated gas generation to below 5%, delivering a reduction in the carbon intensity of the electricity grid to approximately 15g CO2/kWh. And whilst their target is clearly something that would be averaged over the whole year rather than achieved every day, November’s weather is a reminder of the challenge of operating a power system with high levels of weather dependent renewables, sustainably.

Recognising this, the report acknowledges that there will be an important role for biomass to play beyond the end of the existing renewables contracts which finish in 2027. NESO says that they anticipate biomass capacity in 2030 to remain broadly at the same level today, with some biomass units converted to BECCS or bioenergy with carbon capture and storage. For unabated biomass - biomass power without carbon capture - they envisage a shift towards dispatchable generation to help meet demand during times of low wind and solar output and say that BECCS would run with high load factors to maximise carbon removals. 

Their report identifies the importance of the negative emissions from BECCS in meeting the UK’s decarbonisation targets, but their carbon intensity figure of 15gCO2/kWh doesn’t include the negative emissions from BECCS. If included, NESO say that the power sector can reach just 5gCO2/kWh in 2030 with one unit of BECCS, and will turn net carbon negative with two units. This illustrates the significant contribution that BECCS – like the project I’m leading at Drax Power Station in Yorkshire – can make to fighting climate change. 

Whether you attribute the benefits of carbon offsets from BECCS to the grid network or to discount emissions from other sectors is immaterial when it comes down to the UK’s national targets. The week before last saw the conclusion of COP29, in Azerbaijan during which the UK Prime Minister Keir Stamer used his speech to outline an ambitious update to UK climate change targets, stating that the country will now work towards an 81% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2035 compared to 1990 levels. To put this in context, so far, the UK has achieved a 50% reduction – largely driven through the shift away from coal generation – something we at Drax helped pioneer.  

The Government’s own pathways envisaged to achieve their target states that we’ll need at least 23mt of carbon removals in the UK operational from 2035 – that’s equivalent to nearly 6 times the amount of carbon removals each unit at Drax Power Station could achieve with BECCS. 

At Drax we’ve already played a huge part in the energy transition and its clear we’ll have a big role to play in meeting the increasingly stringent targets adopted by the UK. Whilst the need case for our project is compelling, the Government’s progress in developing CCS in the UK has been slower than we’d like to see. In October they announced funding of £21.7bn for new CCS projects in Teesside and the North West – that was the conclusion of their ‘Track-1’ process that was originally initiated way back in 2021. 

It's a great first step for the country and paves the way for the wider deployment of carbon capture but it’s important that they update the industry on steps for Track-1 expansion and Track-2 soon. When the Track-1 funding was announced in the House of Commons the Energy Secretary, Ed Milliband and other DESNZ officials faced numerous questions from our region’s MPs on when the next phase of projects such as those in the Humber would be progressed and he sought to provide re-assurance that Track-1 is the first step and there are plans to continue the role out to areas soon. With the comprehensive spending review however now being reported as being slated for June 2025, the industry is unlikely to hear much by way of updates until the middle of next year.

Regardless of short-term delays, the launch of NESO’s Clean Power 2030 report and the commitment to more stringent climate targets have helped reestablish the UK as a global leader in the fight against climate change.  At Drax, we stand ready to help them deliver that ambition - whatever the weather.