Renewables provide more than half of the UK electricity for first time

Renewable sources of energy have generated more electricity than coal and gas in the UK for the first time. On Wednesday 7th June 2017, power from wind, solar, hydro and wood pellet burning supplied 50.7% of UK energy. If you add in energy from nuclear the low carbon sources were producing 72.1% of electricity in the UK.

National Grid’s data at lunchtime on Wednesday showed that solar panels produced around 7.6GW of electricity while wind farms generated 9.5GW of power.

At the time of Wednesday’s record, 1% of demand was met by battery storage, this will have to increase as the UK moves towards a low-carbon electricity system.

On Tuesday, a tenth of the UK’s power was coming from offshore wind farms. So much power was being generated by wind turbines, that prices fell to a tenth of their normal level.

(Source: BBC News)

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