A decade ago about 40% of Britain's electricity came from coal, but now, the country is about to pass a significant landmark - at midnight on Wednesday it will have gone two full months without burning coal to generate power and completely relied on renewable energy – an alternative to sourcing electricity.
When Britain decided to lockdown, electricity demand plummeted; the National Grid responded by taking power plants off the network.
The four remaining coal-fired plants were the first to be shut down. No coal has been burnt for electricity since. The current coal-free period smashes the previous record in June last year, which was 18 days, 6 hours and 10 minutes.
The figures apply to Britain only, as Northern Ireland is not on the National Grid.
However, it reveals just how dramatic the transformation of energy system has been in the last decade.
Thanks to a massive investment in renewable energy over the last decade made the country not to use the fuel which was the backbone of the grid.
Two examples illustrate just how much the UK's energy networks have changed.
A decade ago, just 3% of the country's electricity came from wind and solar, which many people saw as a costly distraction. Now, the UK has the biggest offshore wind industry in the world, as well as the largest single wind farm, completed off the coast of Yorkshire last year.
At the same time Drax, the country's biggest power plant, has been taking a different path to renewable energy. The plant, which is also in Yorkshire, generates 5% of the country's electricity. A decade ago, it was the biggest consumer of coal in the UK but switching to compressed wood pellets. Drax plans to phase out coal entirely by March next year.
Renewables have generated more power than all fossil fuels put together, this year.
Breaking it down, renewables were responsible for 37% of electricity supplied to the network versus 35% for fossil fuels.
Nuclear accounted for about 18% and imports for the remaining 10% or so, according to figures from the online environmental journal, Carbon Brief.
The decline in the role of fossil fuels in general and coal in particular looks set to continue.
The first time, when renewable power out-generated fossil fuels was in December 2016.
Previously, there had been a total of 154 days, when the combined power created from renewable sources exceeded those from fossil fuels.
Carbon Brief says that 91 of those days occurred in 2019.
The remaining three coal plants in the UK will shut down within five years.
And, then the fuel that brought the industrial revolution in Britain almost two centuries ago will be a thing of the past.
ความคิดเห็น