Coal: Diminishing But Still Relied On

Business Up North reports how coal output fluctuations highlight a major shift in power market trends. Detailing a study by energy market monitoring company, EnAppSys, the publication details how coal’s share of the GB power mix fell to a record low in this year’s first quarter, to just 9.4% (8.12TWh). When one looks back to the same quarter in 2012, coal’s share was 58.4%, equating to 40.33TWh.

As shentongroup has highlighted on a number of occasions, the UK’s sustainable sources of power are not completely reliable and the National Grid’s reserve power levels have at times been very low. As a result, there were instances this quarter when the country’s coal plants ‘came to the rescue’ when there were shortages of power from other sources. On Thursday March 1st, National Grid issued a gas deficit warning which indicated a shortage of gas while coal power filled the gap, generating 10.5GW of electricity.

EnAppSys pointed out that, with the country’s coal power plants set to close over the coming years, there is a risk that gas shortages endanger the country’s ability to generate sufficient electricity. The Capacity Mechanism has secured generating capacity into the future. However, some 70% of this is gas-fired and another 10 per cent is sourced from abroad, with some of the supplier countries having experienced gas shortages at the same time as the UK.

So once more, the point that UK organisations, especially those with critical power requirements, should put in place continuous power safeguards rings truer than ever.  shentongroup, the UK’s Leading Technical Experts in Standby Power, Uninterruptible Power Supplies and Combined Heat & Power Systems provides organisations of all sizes and across all sectors with the continuous power solutions that keep them fully operational, regardless of National Grid power.

If you’re wondering where to start, then take a look at our selection of white papers here and our library of continuous power case studies will help to put things into perspective. Click here to speak to a member of our team for further details.