The Scottish government has awarded a contract to explore opportunities for floating offshore wind and hydrogen supply chains in Scotland and France.
The award of the contract to the European Marine Energy Centre (EMEC) follows a competitive tender. EMEC will partner with French engineering firm Innosea and London-based Renewables Consulting Group (RCG) to carry out research. The aim is to understand the technical status of floating wind and hydrogen in Scotland and France and identify ways that collaboration can be encouraged to address challenges of mutual interest.
EMEC said that floating wind and hydrogen technologies are central to energy decarbonisation strategies in both countries and internationally, and that collaborative research and development can identify new engineering solutions to increase the competitiveness of the technologies.
The UK is in the middle of an energy storage boom, a new report has shown, with capacity set to rise significantly in the coming years.
More than 16.1GW of battery storage capacity is operating, under construction or being planned across 729 projects, according to the latest Energy Storage Project Intelligence report from trade association RenewableUK. The previous report, published in December 2019, identified a total pipeline of 10.5GW across 600 projects – in 2012, applications stood at just 2MW.
The capacity in development represents a significant portion of the UK’s energy demand. According to Gridwatch, the average demand in 2014 was 34.42GW.
https://www.imeche.org/news/news-article/report-shows-huge-scale-of-uk-energy-storage-boom
Western Power Distribution (WPD) will be investing up to £20 million in the electricity grid to boost green growth and jobs across the West Midlands between now and 2023.
The company, which looks after the electricity network in the region, has launched the initiative in a bid to further support green technologies, as the UK looks to recover from the economic impacts of the pandemic over the coming years.
WPD’s investment will upgrade and build new electrical infrastructure and substations, enabling more green developments, such as electric vehicle chargers, mass heat pump installations and renewable generation to connect to the electricity network.