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“Jump to transparency – it won’t always be optional”
Flash back to the winter: securing the supply-demand balance of electricity was almost entirely a supply-side issue with over £30 million paid to ageing plant to remain on standby in case the already thin margins dwindled beyond further.
At the time, just £2.25 million was paid out to the likes of Tata Steel and Anglian Water, which agreed to cut their demand on the grid during the period when demand peaks.
Back then, the popularity of demand-side innovation and decentralised solutions was just beginning to gain traction and National Grid had to stress that actually it really did want to support the burgeoning demand-side sector, and that its share of the grid balancing pie would increase every year.
It’s new stuff, you see, and we’ve all got to walk before we run.
This week saw evidence that perhaps National Grid is right: it’s opted to take a second round of tendering for 1GW of capacity to both supply and demand sides (with no specific allocation target) but far from being welcomed with open arms, the tender has had to be extended while demand-side capacity providers wrap their minds around the concept.
I don’t mention this to criticise the fledgling industry – far from it. It seems everyone has cottoned on to the idea that while we’ve spent years chasing megawatts we should have spent more time on negawatts. But now that the industry has embraced the idea, perhaps more businesses should be encouraged to follow suit.
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