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Britain’s target to decarbonise the electricity system by 2030 is “incredibly stretching” and will be achieved only with big policy reforms with no hitches along the way, a top National Grid executive has warned.
Alice Delahunty, president of UK electricity transmission at the FTSE 100 company, said there was an “awful lot more to do” to meet the ambition — a core part of the Labour party’s pre-election manifesto.
“I think it’s an incredibly stretching target,” she said. “If it went perfectly along current regimes, it wouldn’t get there. So, it needs to go perfectly along reformed regimes.”
National Grid, which owns the bulk of the country’s electricity cable network, has a big role in meeting the 2030 target, which will require greater investment in electricity networks to carry renewable power to homes and businesses around the country.
The company plans to invest about £30bn in the UK over the next five years, having raised £7bn via a rights issue in May to help fund the programme of upgrades alongside investments in the US.
National Grid has previously called on the government to speed up and improve planning processes, and has pushed for a “strategic spatial energy plan” outlining where different types of electricity generation and infrastructure should be built.
“There’s still an opportunity to have fast-track mechanisms for strategically important projects, like transmission projects,” she said in an interview with The House, a weekly political magazine.
Her comments come as the National Energy System Operator prepares advice for the government on how to reach the 2030 goal. NESO is the government-owned body bought out of National Grid on October 1 to oversee the development of Great Britain’s electricity and gas networks.
Low-carbon sources, such as wind, solar and nuclear, supplied a record 60.3 per cent of electricity generation in 2023, according to official data, while the UK’s last coal-fired power plant closed last month.
However, 34.7 per cent came from unabated gas-fired power plants. Reducing this will require a significant increase in wind and solar panels, pylons and cables, electricity storage and potentially nuclear power.
Ed Miliband, energy secretary, has taken steps to support clean energy developers, including approving large solar farms and increasing the budget for offshore wind subsidy support, and pledging to take on the “blockers” and “delayers”.
However, developing the required infrastructure and technical capability to overhaul the electricity system by the 2030 deadline remains a challenge.
“There has been huge progress, but there’s still an awful lot more to do, and that is going to require that sort of clarity of ambition, continuing the sort of pace they’ve shown, and determination to see it through,” said Delahunty.
She also said that “2030 can’t be at the expense of what happens after 2030”; the UK has a legally binding target to cut emissions across the economy to net zero by 2050.
“Everyone wants to avoid that situation where this is too quick and mistakes are made,” she added.
