Getting energy systems right: views from Nick Winser and Alan Whitehead

A whole system view and a “non-negotiable” commitment to government investment in smart grids are just two of the key elements that the Energy Systems Catapult chair and the shadow minister for energy and climate change set out as integral to the successful transformation of the UK energy system. Jane Gray reports.

Winser and Whitehead were among the opening speakers for this year’s iteration of the Energy Networks Association’s Low Carbon Networks and Innovation Conference. Following on from one another both articulated clear agendas for the successful decarbonisation and decentralisation of the UK energy system – across heat, gas and power – in order to deliver an answer to that sector bugbear, the trilemma.

Below is a summary of the key insights and recommendations each delivered to delegates at the Liverpool conference.

Nick Winser

The former National Grid executive director began by setting out his reasons for enthusiasm about his new role at the Energy Systems Catapult, an organisation established to accelerate the realisation of economic value held in emerging technologies for energy systems.

He explained “simplistically” but clearly, why such as institution is an important addition to the UK’s energy innovation landscape now that the consensus which existed in the 1990s – that system transformation would be achieved by first decarbonising electricity via the application of “big chunks” of fairly mature technologies, including nuclear and offshore wind, and then electrifying heat and transport – no longer adds up.

Now that this consensus has more or less been replaced with a model for transformation which is “multi-vector” and includes roles for gas, district heating and a range of decentralised energy technologies, there is a real need for a body which can facilitate innovation among a dynamic and broad ranging group of participants he explained.

The new approach to energy system transformation is clearly one which excites Winser and which he believes will deliver great value because although it is more complex, it should also be “more economic he said.

But before the work of achieving a dynamic, decentralised energy system can really begin in earnest, Winser said that three things need to be accepted.

1. We need to take a whole system view: This means “thinking about the institutional architecture of the energy system” said Winser. Today this architecture is based on national “slices” which look at each energy vector separately he went on. But if we chose to take the more complex route to energy transformations – “that I believe can be very successful and very economic – we need to have a multi-vector and international understanding of the energy system. Crucially, Winser said this understanding must also integrate with “a very local view of our energy systems, particularly how people’s homes work and how people react to energy and new products.Winser welcomed the Institution of Engineering and Technology’s new future power systems architecture project as a good step on the way to achieving a system view of electricity transformation but commented “I think as we see the outputs of that we will think ‘hmm’ that really does need to be multi-vector”.
2. We need better tools for analysis and modelling: To be able to plan a multivector approach to energy system transformation we must first be able to models such an approach and to “show with great skill and in detail how system integration is going to work at every point between now and 2050 in quite a complex way”.
3. We need more innovation: We need to assist a wide pool of new ideas, products and services on their journey to market said Winser. If we can do so successfully, with special attention to helping innovations to bridge the so called ‘valley of death’ which means that so many great ideas and products fail in their mid-technology readiness levels, then it will be “great news for the UK because that means we’ll be able to maintain our lead and our edge that will enable us to engage in export markets” said Winser. By focussing on broad-based innovations we can bring forward a “swathe of multi-vector solutions – incremental, more economic solutions which, when knitted together, can achieve a secure, affordable solution at each point towards hitting the 2050 environmental targets.”

Alan Whitehead

Speaking directly after Winser, the shadow minister for energy and climate change, backed up Winser’s vision for the energy system and said that the recent energy policy “reset” announced by the Department for Energy and Climate change had failed to grasp the implications of decentralisation.

Whitehead suggested that there is a significant gap between what policy makers “should be doing” to support a transition to a smart, low carbon economy and “what they are doing”. Policy makers are still caught up in discussions about “whether” smart grids and decentralised energy will form part of this transition he added, and have not fully absorbed that the evolution of smart grids, connecting gas, power and heat “are too important to our collective future” to be left to chance and market forces.

A confident advocate of smart grid technology, Whitehead showed, as he is wont, rare understanding for a politician of the challenges being faced by the UK energy system. In particular he showed appreciation for the pressure that energy networks are now under to carve out a place in the consciousness of consumers having previously sought to deliver their services “with nobody noticing at all”.

From a policy perspective, Whitehead cautioned that this historical approach has led government only to really notice the energy networks “when something goes wrong” and to develop policy in a way which rushes to identify “what can be done to restore more of the same rather than what needs to be done to transform the system.”

Failing to develop an energy policy which has a clear pathway for the evolution of smart grids and decentralised energy with accompanying markets for demand side management, response and storage will translate to a tacit acceptance from government that it is willing to “tolerate the waste of hard won new resources” said Whitehead. If this is allowed to happen then “not only will we not make the progress that we should toward the overall decarbonisation of the system but we are potentially throwing away the effective use of those resources which we have worked hard to put into place.”

White head said that he sees a “rich future” for electricity distribution networks as more “dynamic system operators” and also emphasized his belief that the wide scale electrification of heat and transport, leading to the demise of gas as a major player in the energy system “simply will not happen”.

Rather than “securing the challenge of its own extinction” Whitehead said that the gas industry should look forward to a bright future including the increasing use of green gas, interaction with district heat technologies and integration with the electricity system through power to gas schemes.

To enable this dynamic, multi-vector energy system however, Whitehead said that policy makers must avoid the assumption that smart grids are “just another technology that should not be unfairly advantaged by picking winners and which we will put in the pot of competing technologies which we will leave the market to eventually sort out”.

Government should understand that smart grids “are the glue” that will hold all other technologies and part6s of the energy system of tomorrow together said Whitehead. As such, he defined them as a “non-negotiable” piece of national infrastructure.

Moreover, Whitehead said that government support for the transformation of energy networks should be “a public good investment”.

“We should not just be hoping that the investment in smartening appears and can be implemented,” he concluded. “We should be positively planning as to how investment can be facilitated and supported.”