Since the energy price spikes and volatility in electricity markets last year, precipitated by rising wholesale gas prices, the EU Commission has looked to a reform of market design as a systematic answer to the impact of these prices on Europeans.

Response to Shell Energy Security Scenarios and meeting the long-term challenge of climate change

Last month was European Sustainability Week, which focussed on the theme ‘Going Green and Digital for Europe’s Energy Transition’. With the continuation of the conflict in Ukraine threatening the continent’s energy supply, and a commitment to decarbonisation by 2050, Europe is devoting significant attention to ensuring energy security. Despite the immediate nature of this winter’s gas crisis, however, the theme of the week demonstrated that Europe sees an opportunity to accelerate the long-term transition to clean, reliable, affordable energy.

ENODA’s response in full to the review of Electricity Market Arrangements consultation. We have largely focussed on areas we believe need to be amended in order to take full advantage of new, effective technologies like Enoda’s Prime. For this reason, we have focussed on those sections which look at balancing and ancillary services markets and given no opinion on questions of investment in or acceleration of low-carbon generation.

A legacy grid design, to be simultaneously reliable, affordable, and sustainable, requires solutions from first principles innovation to be fit for purpose in a Net Zero future. The total value of the Balancing Markets more than doubled during the 2019-2021 period

Coal is political and environmentally untenable. Nuclear is politically unpalatable in many places, unaffordable, and following Russia’s attack on the Zaporizhzhia, Europe's largest nuclear plant, an unacceptable security risk. The inflexibility of nuclear power station output also makes nuclear difficult to integrate with the variable demand of electric vehicles. I worry that many countries will sacrifice their climate goals to achieve security through a system that combines electrification of transport and coal-fired power. We do not have to do this.