This year, Ofgem released a Call for Input (CfI) on the Future of Distributed Flexibility. Ofgem begins by introducing some of the issues which are resulting in a lower uptake of distributed flexibility on the electricity system than there ought to be.

Across the world, the public have been promised that they will be able to benefit from the falling price of renewable energy, but they have been misled. Regulators and politicians acted with the best possible motives as they sought to provide cheap and green energy, but many people failed to understand the true underlying dynamics of a system dominated by renewable energy. In moving from a system where supply could easily adjust to follow demand to one where supply would be driven by the weather, policymakers appear not to have properly accounted for the value of the stability services provided by thermal generation, nor the cost of provisioning stability for a system based on renewables.