Asked by Baroness Featherstone To ask Her
Majesty’s Government what action they are taking to address
regulatory, economic and market barriers to energy storage. The
Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Business,
Energy and Industrial Strategy (Lord Prior of Brampton)
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Asked by
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To ask Her Majesty’s Government what action they are taking
to address regulatory, economic and market barriers to
energy storage.
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for
Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (Lord Prior of
Brampton)
My Lords, my department and Ofgem recently held a joint
call for evidence on a proposed approach for addressing
these barriers. A smart systems plan will be published in
the spring setting out specific measures to be taken
forward.
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(LD)
I thank the Minister for that Answer. Can he assure me that
in the Government’s response to that call for evidence we
will see the introduction of a regulatory definition for
energy storage that will, among other benefits, eliminate
the double charging that is currently imposed on such
facilities?
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In paragraph 32 on page 34 of the call for evidence there
is a suggested definition of storage. That is very much
part of the consultation, and we will have a very firm view
on that definition. Clearly removing the double charging
where people who are operating storage also have to pay the
end consumption levies is something for which we will have
clear plans when we publish our response to the call for
evidence.
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(Con)
My Lords, with the exception of pump storage, is it not the
case that genuinely commercial storage systems for
electricity do not exist, even to compensate for unreliable
renewable energy?
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My Lords, as my noble friend will know, there are
developments in new battery technology, such as lithium
ion, which is a new technology that holds out huge hopes
not just for powering electric vehicles but for storing
energy, which could then be fed into the grid. The
regulatory system is running behind the new technology, if
you like, which is why we have issued the call for
evidence.
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(Lab)
My Lords, this is indeed a very complex area. To allow
greater deployment, a new definition for storage should be
developed to reflect its role in generation, demand and
providing network balance. Does the Minister agree that the
licensing of storage under the Electricity Act should be a
special flexible case to allow these roles to develop?
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My Lords, battery technology could offer huge benefits to the
way that we both generate and store electricity and could
provide better capacity to our electricity system in the UK.
It could also enable us better to deal with the more
intermittent nature of some renewable energy. The work done
by Imperial College indicates that the savings per annum for
producing electricity in this country could run at between £1
billion and £2 billion a year, so it is very important that
we get the regulatory system right.
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(Lab)
My Lord, the Government recently announced a special tariff
addition to people’s electricity bills to cover emergency
stand-by generation to meet the peaks in—I think this was the
wording—“weekday evenings”. Apparently, they are particularly
targeting coal-fired power stations and nuclear power
stations. How do you switch them on and off just like that
for a peak in one evening?
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My Lords, I do not think that there is any intention to
switch nuclear power stations on and off to cover short-term
peaks in demand; coal-fired generation, on the other hand, is
much more flexible in that regard. The whole point of these
new smart systems is to allow much better demand management
over the peaks and troughs of energy demand so that,
hopefully, we will need less generation capacity in the
future than we have done in the past.
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(Lab)
My Lords, further to my noble friend’s last question, I
believe that we are still using a good deal of nuclear
energy—usually electricity—from France. Are we making any
contingency arrangements, should there be problems post
Brexit over the fact that we rely upon that source of energy?
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My Lords, if there is any issue about availability of
supplies from France, it probably relates more to the fact
that a number of France’s nuclear plants are nearing the end
of their lives than to anything that comes out of Brexit. In
fact, as the noble Lord may know, we are investing in more
interconnector capacity, which would increase the capacity
from 2,200 megawatts to more than 7,000 megawatts. Again,
that should reduce the cost of electricity to our consumers.
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(GP)
My Lords, I do not hear the Government talking much about
microgeneration, which provides a real opportunity to get
local people to invest. Is that something that the Minister’s
department is looking at?
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My Lords, again, the development of battery technology and
electric vehicles means that every consumer in the country
could become a small generator in due course and be able not
only to take electricity from the grid during downtimes but
also to feed back energy from their electric car or their own
battery in their own home during peak times. We are looking
at, I think, a revolution in the way that we manage
electricity in this country.
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