The Government needs to make grid updates, an energy blackout here could kill whatever momentum net zero still has - Chris Hocknell

This has highlighted the challenges of integrating high levels of renewable energy into existing power grids.

Solar and wind power, despite their substantial carbon benefits, lack a vital ingredient in electrical supply, called ‘inertia’. Traditional generation methods, such as fossil fuel, hydro, and nuclear power, rely on synchronous generators with large and extremely heavy rotating masses of up to 400 tonnes of steel rotating at 3,000 RPM.

This provides significant energy inertia because they will keep spinning if an interruption occurs. Renewable energy sources, conversely, connected via power electronics, do not naturally possess this inertia unless they are actively managed through advanced technical solutions. When power electronics stop, they stop instantly, without a gradual output decay like a heavy spinning rotor would provide.

This incident raises the important questions about whether adequate investment has been made. Essential infrastructure enhancements, such as synthetic inertia technologies, robust backup power solutions, and enhanced frequency-response systems must accompany significant renewable energy deployment.

For the UK, with its substantial and growing reliance on renewable sources, the Iberian blackout serves as a cautionary tale. Although the UK grid has thus far avoided major blackouts, it has increasingly experienced periods of reduced resilience and tighter capacity margins.

For example, January 8 this year got a lot of attention, as the margin between electricity demand and available supply became very narrow, had a fault caused a single small power station to ‘trip’ out of the system, there would have been a shortfall resulting in a blackout for some consumers.

NESO, the grid operator in the UK does a stellar job, but it can only manage with the infrastructure it has.

Ensuring grid stability and resilience in the UK requires continued and deliberate investment and the trade-off between cost efficiency and grid resilience cannot be ignored any longer.

Adequate capacity margins and advanced grid management strategies, including battery storage, synthetic inertia technologies, and demand-side response mechanisms, are essential for maintaining reliability as renewable generation increases.

A diversified energy strategy combining renewables with stable technologies such as nuclear, and dispatchable sources such as hydro, or gas-fired plants equipped with carbon capture and storage is crucial. One blackout could see public trust in renewables turn off overnight. The government must heed this warning, and make the necessary grid upgrades before it’s too late.

Chris Hocknell is the founder of sustainability consultancy Eight Versa.