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Written Question
Hydroelectric Power
Monday 18th March 2019

Asked by: Viscount Hanworth (Labour - Excepted Hereditary)

Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the potential in the UK for additional pumped storage hydro electricity generation; and whether such facilities can be accommodated within the capacity mechanism without the need for further legislation.

Answered by Lord Henley

We recognise that electricity storage technologies, including pumped hydro storage, provide an important source of flexibility to our energy system. We currently have around 3GW of storage capacity on our system, of which the vast majority is pumped hydro storage. The Electricity System Operator estimates that, by 2050, there could be 12-29 GW of total storage capacity on our system.

Our 2017 Smart Systems and Flexibility Plan and 2018 Progress Update set out a range of actions to remove barriers to storage and ensure flexibility is fairly valued in our energy markets. Pumped storage hydro is able to access the Capacity Market in the same way as other technologies, though a number of issues were raised in the recent Capacity Market review “Call for Evidence” which we will be considering.