Can the grid take Ed Miliband’s net zero targets?

Ed Miliband, along with those who support his ambition to decarbonise the electricity grid by 2030, has long had a favourite argument with which to try to put down people who say it can’t be done: why, if it is going to be so difficult to achieve, is the National Grid ESO – the company which manages the electricity network – not more worried? It is true the company has not been protesting openly about government policy, yet it transpires that in private it is another story. ESO executives, the Telegraph reports this morning, have warned that the South East could be facing blackouts by 2028 as a result of the switch towards intermittent and less predictable wind and solar.

Besides the intermittency issue, one problem is that a lot of the wind capacity being added to the grid is in the North Sea or the Scottish Highlands, a long way from where the demand for power is greatest.