Accelerating innovation and creating economies of scale for technologies that help connect and enable our future energy system
Future energy system
About the future energy system
In the past, the UK has relied on a handful of fossil fuel generation plants dotted around the country to supply our power. In the future, we’ll have many more renewable power sources of all sizes, right across the country and out at sea. Building a low carbon energy system will mean a fundamental change to the way we design the physical network and how we manage the flow of energy around it.
Renewable energy is low cost and abundant, but the wind doesn’t always blow. Building more storage will be necessary to help manage the peaks and troughs of wind generation, capturing power when it’s abundant and releasing it when needed. Low carbon electricity can be used to convert water to hydrogen – itself a low carbon fuel - which can be stored for long periods and will help industry and transport to decarbonise. The network will need to be expanded to carry power from a range of renewable sources to where it's needed in our communities.
