Energy customers will keep paying millions of pounds a year to wind farm operators to turn their machines off unless the UK urgently invests in developing energy storage, according to a new report just released.
Public concerns are raised again about the  millions of pounds that are being spent in constraint payments from National Grid to wind farm operators – effectively paying them to turn off their generators as the electricity is deemed to be ‘wrong time’.
Recent figures from the Renewable Energy Foundation (REF) claim that £8.7m in constraint payments were made to wind farms in March, part of the £13,749,814 already paid out this year. In 2013, wind farms received £32,707,351.
Under existing market arrangements, if an energy company generating electricity is unable to supply its power to the grid because it is not required it is entitled to constraint payments.
Dr Tim Fox, Head of Energy and Environment at the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, said:
“We know that energy bills are going to rise in future, but unless we invest in energy storage technology these constraint payments are set to become an unnecessary additional cost for the consumer.
Virtually any form of energy storage could help alleviate this problem, by allowing surplus generation from intermittent renewable sources to be stored by power providers until needed for use at a different time when demand exists.
“The intermittency challenge of renewable sources arises from the fact that the wind does not always blow, the sun does not always shine and the waves are not always in motion at times when consumers demand electricity. Equally, the converse is also true, in that consumer demand for power can be low when renewable energy sources are highly active.”
On just one day in August 2013, £1.84m was paid to operators of 28 wind-farms in Scotland to turn off their turbines and not generate electricity.
Between 2011 and 2012, constraint payments from National Grid to wind farm operators totalled more than £34 million. This represented just over 10% of the total paid to all electricity generators in UK, despite wind power accounting for less than 5% of our energy production.
In the same period, more than £340 million was paid in constraint payments to all UK electricity generators – approximately £13 for every household.