National Grid: Britain’s power supplies will see out the winter despite Brexit
Britain will have enough power and gas to see out the winter even with Brexit, but could need regular supplies of liquefied natural gas (LNG).
The UK is set to leave the EU at the end of this month but the terms are still unclear.
Read more: National Grid calls for security review following massive August power cut
National Grid, which operates the UK power network, expects power links with Europe, called interconnectors, to continue to flow.
But in the unlikely event they fall to zero there is sufficient surplus power to meet demand.
National Grid has been under scrutiny after a power outage in August affected 1.1m electricity customers in Britain.
“We anticipate no additional adequacy or operability challenges for the coming winter as a result of the UK’s planned exit from the EU,” the grid operator said.
“Our analysis shows … margins that are sufficient even in a scenario with no interconnector flows between the UK and continental Europe. However, the market would need to attract regular LNG supplies to the UK,” it added.
LNG imports into Britain quadrupled last winter to 6.6m tonnes and peaked at 1.6m tonnes in April, a multi-year high.
Read more: Government sets out scope for probe into National Grid outage
That came as supplies from the United States and Russia inundated Europe and depressed prices.
National Grid expects this winter’s gas demand to be slightly higher than last winter at 52.3bn cubic metres because of higher exports to Ireland and Europe.