At a time when rising energy costs seem to affect every economy and household, Britain has come out with its latest energy strategy document. Its key focus is expansion of nuclear and offshore wind power as well as hydrogen and solar production to fulfill the country’s energy demand.
Triggered by the current energy supply crunch due to the war in Ukraine by Russia, UK’s prime minister Boris Johnson, desperately seeks to put an energy supply plan in place, despite opposition from some quarters.
"We’ve got the ambition, we’ve got the vision – and, with this plan, we’re going to bring clean, affordable, secure power to the people for generations to come," said Mr. Johnson in a statement.
Under the arrangement, eight more nuclear reactors could be added on existing sites as part of the UK's new energy strategy. But experts have called for a bigger focus on energy efficiency and improving home insulation. The UK government plans to get 95% of the UK's electricity from low-carbon sources by 2030. It hopes to produce up to 50 gigawatts (GW) of energy through offshore wind farms to power homes in the UK.
Below, we list some highlights of the new energy strategy:
Nuclear power: Eight new nuclear reactors, in addition to two at Sizewell in Suffolk will reduce the country reliance on oil and gas with capacity increase from 7 gigawatts to 24GW.
Wind: Policies and planning for new offshore wind farms are laid out in the plan. Offshore wind target has been from 40GW to 50GW (from 11GW currently)
Hydrogen: Hydrogen production will provide cleaner energy for industry, power, transport and heating with up to 10GW of hydrogen power by 2030
Solar: Facilitate installation of solar panels for residences and commercial building to help increase the current solar capacity from 14GW to 70GW by 2035.
Oil and gas: Opening up of North Sea projects to internally produce gas in the hopes of lower carbon footprint.
Heat pumps: A £30m ‘heat pump investment accelerator competition’ planned to make British heat pumps.
The UK has allocated the largest ever research and development budget worth £39.8 billion across the department for business, energy and industrial strategy’s partner organisations.
