The worst pandemic in nearly a century, Russia's invasion of Ukraine and a global economic downturn have caused historic volatility across the energy sector.

Such a spiral of dramatic events has made it difficult to keep track of stories that don't flare up in 24-hour news cycles or trend easily on Twitter, such as renewables' steady rise in the UK's energy mix.

This was confirmed only last week by the National Grid's electricity system operator - which revealed wind power provided 21GW of generation for the first time ever over a half-hour window on 10 January.

Ambitious government targets have followed. They include ramping up solar power from 14GW to 70GW by 2035 and boosting offshore wind from 11GW of assets to 50GW by the end of the decade - alongside an ambition to reach 10GW of hydrogen over the same time period.

The challenge now for the Government is harnessing that potential rapid expansion - making the possibility of storing that energy to meet the UK's future needs increasingly vital as the country shifts away from fossil fuels.

BATTERY STORAGE: THE PLUSSES AND NEGATIVES The European Union and the UK has staved off blackouts this winter with the aid of vast top-ups of liquefied natural gas - chiefly from the US - with supplies stored in containers for weeks at a time on the continent.

By contrast, the current timeframe for lithium-ion batteries storing renewable energy is a matter of hours.

Meanwhile mechanical options, such as pumped hydrogen and socalled liquid air have clocked in at around a day of storage.

Adam Bell, head of policy at Stonehaven, and former head of energy at BEIS, was optimistic these challenges would be resolved - with electrical stores like lithium and vanadium flow batteries providing more short-term charging options such as for EVs, while longer-term storage needs would be provided potentially by chemical stores where energy was stored as molecules, such as hydrogen.

He expected both continued innovation in the sector and wide array of energy sources to be available to meet the UK's energy needs alongside - with nuclear in the mix as a baseload alternative.

Bell said: "Each have a different role to play - electrical stores tend to be optimal for intraday solutions, mechanical for intraweek and chemical for intraseasons. Getting the mix of these assets right is a challenge for both Government and the system operator [National Grid], who will need to design the right markets to bring forward the right mix of assets at the right time."

But that doesn't mean gas is going anywhere quickly, either. James Baden, founder and director of storage specialist Zenobe Energy, expected gas to have a continued role in the next two decades.

In his view, the West would have to maintain gas reserves not just for the renewable transition but for future emergency situations after Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

"Everybody became somewhat complacent, having had no war in Europe for 70-80 years," he concluded. PUTTING FAITH IN BREAKTHROUGHS There are reasons to be optimistic. One example of innovation in the energy sector is clean energy specialist Zenobe's battery storage plans to deal with the embarrassing situation where National Grid has to pay wind and solar operators to reduce generation during periods of peak sun and wind power, while also paying gas operators to come online.

For the first 11 months of 2022, National Grid forked out £1.34bn constraining energy supplies - including £122m on wind power - to prevent the grid being overwhelmed.

In the past month, £82m was spent turning off - as first reported by Kona Energy - even amid periods of record generation.

When approached for comment, a spokesperson for its electricity system operator said: "Like many system operators across the world, we make constraint payments to help us keep the electricity network in balance at all times.

"These payments to temporarily reduce generation output are more economical than to over-build expensive new infrastructure. We constantly analyse the balance between constraint costs versus the cost of building new assets and are working with industry to reduce the impact of network constraints while building a greener system."

Zenobe has commercial contracts to develop large 200-300 MW battery facilities which would store power for multiple hours every day, and would be available for the grid during surges - meaning National Grid would no longer have to turn to fossil fuels to deal with shortcomings in renewable power. Something to cheer, at least.

The UK spent £82m turning off wind turbines in the past month

(c) 2023 City A.M., source Newspaper