Menu
Thu, 28 March 2024

Newsletter sign-up

Subscribe now
The House Live All
Regulatory certainty as a key ingredient for industry resilience Partner content
By BASF
Energy
Sellafield: creating a new legacy Partner content
Energy
Why the nuclear industry needs a joined up approach to skills Partner content
By EDF
Education
How advertising can accelerate a sustainable economy Partner content
Environment
A just energy transition for rural areas: no ‘one size fits all’ approach Partner content
By Dimeta
Energy
Press releases
By Ørsted
By Ørsted

SSEN Transmission publishes North of Scotland Future Energy Scenarios Report

SSE

3 min read Partner content

Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks (SSEN) has today published its North of Scotland Future Energy Scenarios report which sets out a range of credible future energy scenarios for its north of Scotland transmission network.


  • Report sets out a range of credible future energy scenarios for the north of Scotland
  • Scenarios focus on the future for renewables, low carbon heat, transport and changes in energy use
  • The report includes a scenario to meet the ambitions of the Paris Climate Change agreement, limiting temperature increases to 1.5 degrees Celsius

As the transmission owner for the north of Scotland, SSEN is responsible for maintaining, operating and developing the north of Scotland transmission network, which over recent years has seen a transformational renewal following the significant growth in renewable energy across the region. 

To help inform what network investments may be required to meet the future needs and expectations of its customers and wider society, SSEN needs to understand the potential future energy developments across its network.

Over the last 18 months, SSEN has undertaken extensive consultation with a broad range of stakeholders to develop a range of credible and evidence based North of Scotland Future Energy Scenarios.  This has focused on a range of areas such as onshore wind repowering, energy efficiency, growth of electric vehicles and new generation and storage.   Informed by this consultation, SSEN has developed a range of future energy scenarios, the details of which have been published today in SSEN’s North of Scotland Future Energy Scenarios report.

These are captured in three broad themes:

  • Proactive Decarbonisation – the most ambitious range from a climate change perspective, this would see decarbonisation targets surpassed across a range of sectors.  Crucially from a climate change perspective, this scenario would deliver a decarbonisation pathway for the north of Scotland in line with that required globally to limit the temperature increase to 1.5 degrees Celsius, as the Paris Agreement aspires to and which the UK is actively pursuing efforts to achieve.
  • Local Optimisation – whilst maintaining the broad ambition of the Proactive Decarbonisation scenario, the speed and scale of ambition shifts towards a greater role for local, small scale solutions, with greater emphasis placed on consumer affordability.
  • Cost Limitation – the least ambitious of the range of scenarios, a stagnant economy leads to a greatly reduced ambition to tackle climate change with affordability instead the primary focus of priority for policy makers.

Although the GB System Operator, National Grid, carries out similar analysis on a GB wide basis, SSEN’s analysis will compliment that of National Grid, helping gain a more focused and tailored understanding of SSEN’s unique network region to inform future network developments.

Commenting on today’s publication Imran Mohammed, Senior Business Insight Analyst, said:

“Insight into expected energy trends and likely scenarios will be vital to help us continue to meet the future needs of our customers, stakeholders and wider society. From this insight, we have built a picture of the range of possible scenarios our network area could face based on feedback from our key stakeholders and their ambitions for the future.

“We would like to thank the wide range of stakeholders that have provided feedback at all stages of the consultation process to help us shape our scenario planning work stream. This engagement and feedback has been invaluable and we hope to continue working closely with all our stakeholders as we build on this scenario planning in the months and years ahead.”

A summary of SSEN’s North of Scotland Future Energy Scenarios headline findings can be found on its website, along with a downloadable copy of the full report: https://www.ssen-transmission.co.uk/information-centre/industry-and-regulation/future-energy-scenarios/

Categories

Energy
Associated Organisation
Podcast
Engineering a Better World

The Engineering a Better World podcast series from The House magazine and the IET is back for series two! New host Jonn Elledge discusses with parliamentarians and industry experts how technology and engineering can provide policy solutions to our changing world.

NEW SERIES - Listen now