{"id":45189,"date":"2019-04-09T08:37:42","date_gmt":"2019-04-09T13:37:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=45189"},"modified":"2019-04-09T08:37:44","modified_gmt":"2019-04-09T13:37:44","slug":"despite-good-progress-100-low-carbon-energy-is-still-a-long-way-off-for-the-uk","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=45189","title":{"rendered":"Despite good progress, 100% low-carbon energy is still a long way off for the UK"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/theconversation.com\/despite-good-progress-100-low-carbon-energy-is-still-a-long-way-off-for-the-uk-114949\">Despite good progress, 100%\u00a0low-carbon\u00a0energy is still a long way off for the\u00a0UK<\/a><\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>In the past ten years the UK\u2019s electricity mix has changed dramatically. Coal\u2019s contribution has dropped from 40% to 6%. Wind, solar power and hydroelectric plants now generate more electricity than nuclear power stations, thanks to rapid growth. Demand for electricity has also fallen, reducing the country\u2019s dependence on fossil fuels. Thanks to these three factors, the carbon intensity of Britain\u2019s electricity has almost halved, from more than 500g of CO\u2082 per kilowatt-hour in 2006 to less than 270g in 2018.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Progress has been so quick that a fully low-carbon power sector in Britain has transformed from a faint pipedream into a&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/unearthed.greenpeace.org\/2019\/03\/27\/interview-scottishpower-ceo-offshore-wind-energy-uk\/\">real possibility<\/a>, according to the CEO of one of the UK\u2019s \u201cbig six\u201d energy companies. Indeed, the National Grid&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.current-news.co.uk\/news\/national-grid-set-for-zero-carbon-power-system-operation-by-2025\">now expects<\/a>&nbsp;to be able to operate a zero-carbon electricity system by 2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Already approaching that milestone on windy, sunny days, the country\u2019s first hours of 100% low-carbon electricity could soon be here \u2013 but staying at 100% throughout the year will be much more difficult to achieve. So what does the journey to decarbonisation look like?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Headwinds to decarbonisation<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>To paint the UK\u2019s energy future, it is important to first understand how electricity is generated today. The graph below is a visualisation of British electricity generation in October 2018. Periods of strong wind (in red) and sun (yellow) combined with nuclear power (green) meant that on some days, more than 75% of electricity came from low-carbon sources. With solar prices still decreasing and the government recently agreeing a\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/unearthed.greenpeace.org\/2019\/03\/27\/interview-scottishpower-ceo-offshore-wind-energy-uk\/\">major deal<\/a>\u00a0for offshore wind to produce one-third of the UK\u2019s power by 2030, the country\u2019s first hours of low-carbon power could arrive within the next five years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&nbsp;\u2026click on the above link to read the rest of the article\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Despite good progress, 100%\u00a0low-carbon\u00a0energy is still a long way off for the\u00a0UK In the past ten years the UK\u2019s electricity mix has changed dramatically. Coal\u2019s contribution has dropped from 40% to 6%. Wind, solar power and hydroelectric plants now generate more electricity than nuclear power stations, thanks to rapid growth. Demand for electricity has also [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[25576,268,25575,8056,8487],"class_list":["post-45189","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-energy-2","tag-andres-crossland","tag-energy-production","tag-jon-gluyas","tag-low-carbon-energy","tag-the-conversation"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45189","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=45189"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45189\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":45190,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45189\/revisions\/45190"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=45189"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=45189"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=45189"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}