This post was prompted by the Drax Electric Insights Quarterly linked to by correspondent Ed T in Blowout Week 231. I had not come across this report before, but it provides a good summary of UK quarterly activity and I have plagiarized it where appropriate.
Figure 1 shows UK generation by source over the period between February 1 and March 31 2018, covering the Beast From the East cold periods. The generation data are five-minute Gridwatch values averaged into hourly intervals and the temperature data are daily means from the Met Office Central England temperature site:
Figure 1: UK hourly generation by source and mean daily Central England temperatures, February 1 to March 31 2018
Imports are plotted at the bottom because this is the only way I have found of displaying negative values (exports) on a stacked bar chart. Together with nuclear and biomass they provided reasonably stable baseload generation.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
From 26th February to 5th March 2018, the UK and indeed most of Northern Europe was gripped by severe cold weather blowing in from Siberia. The event was Christened the Beast From the East by UK press. The conditions were harsh, not just sub-zero temperatures and snow but high winds that created life-threatening conditions. In this post I present the electricity generating statistics for the month 13 February to 12 March. The key point I want to make is that during the week of The Beast the UK’s remaining 10.6 GW of coal ran flat out day and night for 8 days. I think the time has come for the UK Government and National Grid to explain how they plan to keep the lights on when they 
