Question to the Department for Energy Security & Net Zero:

To ask the Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero, what recent estimate his Department has made of the proportion of curtailment costs borne by domestic consumers.

Data relating to curtailment caused by constraints including costs is provided in the National Energy System Operator (NESO) Annual Balancing Report at this link: neso.energy/document/362561/download. Constraint costs, as with other interventions taken by NESO to balance the electricity system, are recovered from consumers through Balancing Service Use of System Charges. Both domestic and non-domestic consumers pay these balancing costs, in proportion to their energy consumption. Although the most energy intensive industries receive additional support with these costs.

The current extent of grid constraints reflects years of underinvestment, with new network infrastructure development having lagged the expansion of new generation. We are already taking action to reduce constraints with the biggest upgrade to Great Britain’s electricity network in decades.