Proactive Investors - Electricity generated by wind power in the UK hit a new high in 2022, according to National Grid PLC (LON:NG.), but natural gas remained the biggest contributor to the power grid.
National Grid Electricity System Operator (ESO) said wind produced 26.8% of the country's annual energy mix, while renewables and nuclear combined generated 48.5% of electricity for the year.
The system operator said it was "getting ever closer" to achieving its goal of 100% zero-carbon energy, which it aims to do by 2035.
But this was a bit of a stretch, as fossil fuels still made up 40% of the total, with natural gas used to create 38.5% of the country’s power and coal produced 1.5%, though this was down from 43% a decade earlier.
Five months of the year saw more than half of electricity came from renewables and nuclear combined.
Electricity coming from zero-carbon sources has also hit peaks in the past week, with the record being broken on 30 December and again this Wednesday, when a half-hour period saw 87.6% of the UK's power coming from clean generators.
The energy crisis sparked by the war in Ukraine has seen countries scrambling to find alternatives to Russian oil.
The International Energy Agency (IEA) outlined the war as a “decisive moment” for renewables, forecasting that by 2027 they will account for 38% of global electricity production.
In the UK, onshore wind developments are being reviewed by the government, following an effective ban put in place in 2015, while companies have ramped up investments in new storage and generation technologies.
SSE PLC's (LON:SSE) recently outlined plans for a hydrogen production and storage facility in Yorkshire, which could be operational by 2025.
Drax Group (LON:DRX), meanwhile, began preliminary work on the expansion of its Crauchan pumped storage hydro Plant in Scotland, which uses excess energy to pump water upwards which can later be released to generate power at times of high demand.
Experts have suggested that new storage is a vital to the UK’s power grid and would end the reliance on coal and gas in times of low wind generation, as renewable energy sources like wind are cheaper but less predictable.