Energy regulator Ofgem has selected a shortlist of long-duration electricity storage projects it says are vital to maximise renewable energy and reduce the cost of paying wind farms to switch off because the excess power cannot be managed.
A total of 77 projects designed to capture excess renewable power for later use, including lithium-ion, flow and sugar-based “super batteries”, as well as pumped-hydro electricity storage, will be considered for inclusion in a bill-payer-backed funding scheme intended to promote innovation and spread risk.
There were 171 applications in total.
The long-duration energy storage (LDES) program is intended to address the problem of intermittent supply from wind and solar, which often produce excess power the grid cannot use, and cannot be stored for later use either.
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Currently, wind farms are routinely paid not to produce power because of “constraints” in the national grid, which means the excess supply, predominantly from the north of Scotland, cannot be directed to areas of peak demand, chiefly in the south of England.
At the same time, gas-fired power stations in the south have to fire up to meet the demand.
Constraint payments exceeded £1bn in 2024 and are scheduled to increase as the energy transition accelerates, adding to consumer bills as renewable capacity is added to the grid faster than it is expanding to cope.
Ofgem says the LDES schemes will help reduce constraint payments and may, in time, reduce bills.
Under the “cap and floor” funding scheme, bill payers will underwrite…
