UK renewables generate more electricity than fossil fuels for the first time

Renewable energy sources provided more electricity in the UK than fossil fuels for the first time ever during the past quarter, revealed new research from Carbon Brief.

Wind farms, solar panels, biomass and hydropower generated 29.5 terawatt hours (TWh) of energy between July and September, compared to 29.1TWh from fossil fuels.

That marked a new milestone in the UK’s road to becoming a zero carbon country by 2050.

Dr Simon Evans, deputy editor of Carbon Brief, told The Independent on Monday: “The UK has made significant progress in cutting its CO2 emissions over the past decade.

“Almost all of that progress is thanks to the electricity sector, which as our analysis shows has seen fossil fuel generation halve since 2010 and renewables increase more than fourfold.

“Other parts of the economy have made very little progress. The UK will not be able to meet its legally-binding carbon targets in future without emissions cuts in other areas, such as heating and transport,” he said.

Out of the total of 29.1TWh from fossil fuels, 28.4TWh came from gas, 0.4TWh came from coal and 0.3TWh from oil, according to data from the Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy (BEIS).

Out of the 29.5TWh from renewable sources of energy, 14.6TWh came from wind, 8.8TWh from biomass, 4.7TWh from solar and 1.4TWh came from hydropower.

The record was broken thanks to a raft of new offshore wind farms which came on-line in 2019 and the closure of a raft of coal plants which would not be allowed to operate after 2025.

By spring 2020, just four coal plants were expected to remain in the UK: the West Burton A and Ratcliffe-on-Soar plants in Nottinghamshire, Kilroot in Northern Ireland and two generation units at the Drax site in North Yorkshire, which were earmarked for conversion to burn gas.