First Update of August 2020 – An overview of last week’s Energy news

Below is this week’s summary. It should be a one minute read relevant to UK energy with links to documents for those who wish to read more.

(Click a bullet point to open the relevant article)

Monday – 3rd August

• An article from University of Southampton staff makes the case for batteries of electric vehicles to provide large scale, dispersed storage of electricity from increasing generation from renewable sources.

• Chinese economy means demand for coal is growing while US and UK economies wind down use of coal.

Tuesday – 4th August

• The £2 billion “Green Homes Grant”, recently announced by the UK chancellor, intended to pay 2/3 of the cost of improving up to 600,000 homes, will include heat pumps. Households will be able to claim up to £5000 to install a heat pump.

Wednesday – 5th August

• UK National Grid has announced plans to explore the potential use of hydrogen to heat homes. 85% of UK homes are currently connected to the mains gas network.

Thursday – 6th August

• A Scottish company specialising in hydrogen production technology has been assigned to deliver the first 2 hydrogen cell re-fuelling sites at Teesside in NE England with support from a UK Government programme.

Friday – 7th August

• Oil and Gas Authority report suggests integrated offshore energy systems including natural gas, hydrogen, renewables and carbon capture and storage could deliver about 30% of reduction in greenhouse gas emissions needed to meet net zero emissions targets by 2050.

• UK households will pay less for energy this winter. The energy price cap is expected to fall to its lowest level since it was introduced in January 2019 due to the recent drop in demand for gas and electricity caused prices to drop.

• A review of infrastructure shows steps towards increasing offshore wind power generation capacity from 10 GW to 40 GW.

Saturday – 8th August

• BBC piece describes the continuing shift to more diverse suppliers of natural gas to UK but raises concerns over storage capacity reducing ability to buy when prices are lower.