The UK’s winter energy supply is secure, Davey says

The UK's energy supply will remain secure this winter despite a string of unplanned outages, according to the energy secretary.

Speaking in the House of Commons on Thursday, Ed Davey said that the outages at EDF Energy’s Heysham-1 and Hartlepool nuclear power plants, along with the loss of generating capacity at SSE’s fire-damaged Ferrybridge coal-fired plant, will not lead to power shortages.

Davey told MPs: “We have taken a number of measures to ensure the security of the UK’s energy supply, including introducing new electricity system balancing measures.

He added: “The impact that that will have on our margins over the winter has already been taken account of in National Grid’s analysis and procurement plans.”

The four nuclear units the four nuclear units, which have a generating capacity of 2.5GW, were taken offline in early August due to safety concerns over the boiler design of the units.

SSE, owner of the Ferrybridge power station, said it expects one of the units to return to service by November at the earliest while the unit most badly affected is only expected to return in March next year.

Davey also told MPs that there have been “really effective” talks with the Norwegian government over the development of the 1.4GW NSN interconnector which could boost secutiry of supply in the longer term.

He added that plans to allow interconnectors to bid into the capacity market from 2015 “have been well received in Oslo by the Norwegian authorities”.

However, the energy secretary was less confident about the proposed IceLink interconnector between the UK and Iceland, which would supply geothermal energy through it.

He said: “We are waiting to hear from the Icelandic authorities on how they want to take that project forward.”