Baillie Wind Farm, Scotland (Statkraft/Flickr)

Cristen Hemingway Jaynes

Reprinted with permission from Ecowatch’s December 19, 2024 blog at https://www.ecowatch.com/energy-prices-below-zero-uk-wind-power.html

Record wind-generated electricity across Northern Ireland and Scotland Tuesday night pushed Britain’s power prices below zero.

Wind output peaked at a record high 22.4 gigawatts (GW), breaking the previous high set Sunday evening, the national system operator said, as Bloomberg reported. The record output provided more than 68 percent of the country’s power.

From 5:30 to 6:30 a.m. on Wednesday, the half-hourly price fell to 6.57 pounds per megawatt-hour, according to data from European power exchange Epex Spot.

“Setting another clean electricity generation record just four days after the previous high shows the pivotal role wind is playing in keeping the country powered up during the festive season,” said Dan McGrail, chief executive of RenewableUK, as reported by Yahoo Finance. “This is also demonstrated by today’s official figures which reveal that renewables have generated more than half our electricity for four quarters in a row.”

The record was a major reversal from last week’s low wind output when electricity was mostly supplied by gas.

The enormous fluctuations in Europe’s weather have demonstrated the challenge to governments in supplying power as the transition to renewable energy speeds up, Bloomberg reported.

When weather in the United Kingdom is cloudy or winds are calm, gas will still be used to generate electricity.

“Indeed, toward the end of last week, windless days saw UK gas-fired plants churn out the most electricity on record. And despite the return of gusty weather since then — with wind output still above 22,000 megawatts on Wednesday morning — robust demand has kept gas-fueled plants online,” reported Bloomberg.

The unpredictable conditions and refueling outages at some nuclear power plants led to gas-fired plants generating roughly 70 percent of the country’s power at times, The Times reported.

Energy prices in the negative numbers have been recorded for 131 hours in the UK this year, an increase of 45 hours over 2023.

NESO, Britain’s energy system manager, has said the country would need approximately 22GW of battery storage — an increase of 17GW — to assist with managing system volatility as intermittent renewable power supplies more of the UK’s electricity.

Wind power was the largest source of energy in the UK from January to September of 2024.

The UK’s Labor government has a goal of quadrupling offshore wind power, doubling onshore wind and tripling solar by 2030, with an overall target of 95 percent green energy.

“This is a historic shift which shows that Britain’s successful transition to clean power is taking place at amazing speed, as we celebrate a landmark year for the UK’s world-class renewable energy sector,” McGrail said, as reported by Yahoo Finance.