Positive Energy: how renewable electricity can transform ... - WWF UK

The scenarios
We commissioned GL Garrad Hassan (GL GH) to investigate this question by developing
six scenarios for where the UK’s electricity will come from in 2030. The scenarios all
achieve the near decarbonisation of the power sector by 2030 without new nuclear power.
The generation mix differs according to the level of electricity demand and the use of
different methods for ensuring system security as shown in the table opposite.
In all cases, the scenarios make full provision for ambitious increases in electric vehicles
(EVs) and electric heating. Energy efficiency and behavioural change lead to the
reductions in demand in the ambitious demand scenarios.
The scenarios all
achieve the near
decarbonisation
of the power
sector by 2030
without new
nuclear power
The volume of renewable capacity installed by 2020 in all scenarios is similar to that set
out in the government’s Renewable Energy Roadmap in July 2011 1 . However, critically,
the scenarios envisage installation continuing at a similar rate during the 2020s. This will
avoid the risk of ‘boom and bust’ in the UK renewables sector – lots of work being done to
install renewable capacity up until 2020 and then work falling off a cliff after that – and
mean renewables provide at least 60% of the UK’s electricity by 2030.
The amount of renewable capacity the UK can and should build is determined by
economic constraints – not available resources or how fast infrastructure can be built.
GL GH assumes that it is economic to supply around 60% of demand from renewables.
Going beyond 60% depends on whether there’s a market in other countries for the
excess electricity the UK would generate at times of high renewable energy production.
Therefore, given uncertainty over future markets, in the core scenarios (A and B) GL GH
has not assumed a European market for UK renewable power despite the construction of
high levels of interconnection under the B scenarios. By contrast, in the stretch scenarios
(C), we assume that interconnection creates a European market for the UK’s excess
power, and that it becomes economic to build much more renewable capacity in the UK.
WWF-UK 2011 Positive Energy page 6