Wind turbines producing just 2% of Britain’s power – because there’s no wind

WIND turbines have been producing only a fraction of Britain’s energy after still conditions saw them grind to a halt.

A ‘wind drought’ this month has seen turbines generate less than 2 per cent of the country’s power.

Scotland accounts for almost 60 per cent of the UK’s total onshore wind capacity and 5 per cent of offshore generation.

Recent figures show that Britain got 15 per cent of its total power from wind last year – twice as much as coal.

But on Sunday this figure fell to only 1.8 per cent, and on Saturday it was 2.6 per cent. Between Monday and yesterday it varied from 6.7 per cent to 8.8 per cent last night.

Scotland’s onshore wind farms yesterday generated 22,536 megawatts worth of power, a tiny fraction of the average of six terawatts needed to power the UK every day.

Forecasts predict that the calm conditions will last until the middle of the month.

Yet during the Beast from the East storm in March that covered much of Britain in snow, at times wind power contributed the biggest share of the nation’s electricity generation.

A record was set when on one day wind power produced 14.3 gigawatts – 35.7 per cent of Britain’s electricity and far ahead of gas on 20.3 per cent. Nuclear was providing 17.6 per cent and coal 12.9 per cent.

Despite the reliability issues surrounding wind energy, First Minister Nicola Sturgeon recently insisted that onshore wind ‘will continue to be’ central to Scotland’s energy needs as the country moves towards a ‘low carbon’ economy.

Earlier this year, she urged the UK Government to bring back subsidies to help the industry expand and hinted her new Scottish National Investment Bank will seek to fund the spread of turbines.

Miss Sturgeon also said the planning system will be ‘streamlined’ to help support green energy developments.

The move came after one of Britain’s biggest energy firms made a personal plea for larger turbines to be allowed in Scotland.

The Scottish Government has already set a target of 50 per cent of the country’s energy use to come from renewables by 2030.

Scotland already has 3,335 turbines on 285 sites producing 6,747 megawatts of energy.

But another 2,957 are in the development pipeline at 192 sites, which could produce a further 11,009 megawatts.

Last year, it emerged that wind farm operators were raking in more than £100,000 day as part of a ‘perverse incentive’ to switch off turbines when it is too windy.

In exceptionally windy conditions, the National Grid cannot cope with the extra energy produced by the turbines so it makes ‘constraint payments’ to operators when they have to close wind farms temporarily.

Figures published earlier this year show that between 2014 and 2016, a total of 6,409 acres of forestry were felled to make way for wind farm developments – the equivalent of ten square miles.

Earlier this week, Greg Clark, Secretary of State for Business Energy and Industrial Strategy, signalled that the UK will take the next step toward agreeing to help Hitachi Ltd finance a new nuclear reactor.

Responding to National Grid wind figures, Frank Gordon, policy manager for the Renewable Energy Association, said: ‘The renewable energy family continues to perform well, powering over 30 per cent of Britain’s commercial and domestic needs over the last year. Waste-to-energy, biomass plants, wind and solar are setting generation records and enjoy record levels of public support.

‘Advances in energy storage technologies ensure energy stability to the grid, storing excess energy produced by renewables such as wind and solar for periods when we experience less wind or sun.

‘Baseload renewable technologies such as waste-to-energy plants, and wave and tidal power also offer reliable sources of renewable energy for periods of high-demand or low generation from other sources due to weather conditions.’

‘Low carbon economy’