The cost of turning down wind turbines in Britain

Grid constraints and wind curtailment

• Large amounts of Scottish and offshore wind are routinely curtailed because north–south transmission capacity is insufficient and key circuits are down for maintenance.
• Curtailment costs (including paying wind to switch off and gas to switch on elsewhere) are high but possibly ~10% of wind output; some see this as “cost of doing business” until more capacity exists.
• Proposed fixes: new “Eastern Green Link” HVDC cables and broader “Great Grid Upgrade”, but these are years late, so high curtailment persists.

Planning, NIMBYism, and bureaucracy

• Commenters blame long UK build times (often a decade) on multi‑layer planning, appeals, and frequent lawsuits; local councils, residents, and statutory consultees can all slow or block projects.
• Strong NIMBY opposition targets pylons, buried lines, battery “farms”, solar farms, onshore and offshore wind, and even infrastructure access roads.
• Some see new “anti‑blocking” planning reforms as necessary; others worry about weakened legal recourse.

Market design and pricing debates

• A central criticism is the “single national price” and marginal pricing model: local surplus wind still prices at national gas‑set levels, so there’s no strong signal to build load or industry near generation.
• Suggested alternatives: zonal/nodal pricing, splitting the market at bottlenecks, or simply not compensating curtailment.
• Supporters argue marginal pricing is how markets work and underpins investment in renewables and interconnectors; critics say it hides transmission scarcity and overpays gas.

Decentralised generation and regulation

• Microgrids and direct local sales are heavily constrained: it’s generally illegal to sell electricity directly to neighbours without a supplier licence, though small‑scale sharing is de‑facto ignored.
• Some countries (e.g. Norway) allow internal “behind‑the‑meter” use over public wires for co‑located sites; commenters note the UK lacks similar flexibility.

Storage, smart demand, and dynamic tariffs

• Grid‑scale batteries, pumped hydro and EVs are seen as key to absorbing excess wind, though round‑trip losses mean economics must beat simple curtailment.
• Dynamic retail tariffs (half‑hourly/15‑minute pricing) already exist in several countries; users automate heat pumps, water heaters, batteries, EVs and appliances via Home Assistant and similar tools.
• Many argue widespread flexible demand could shift usage into windy/solar hours; skeptics note the main UK bottleneck is moving energy geographically, not just shifting it in time.

Alternative sinks for surplus power

• Proposals include bitcoin mining, data centres, green hydrogen, desalination and industrial cooling/heating loads located near generation.
• Some doubt the profitability of intermittent bitcoin/hardware use; others say “stranded” or very cheap energy changes that calculus.
• Hydrogen electrolysis directly on wind farms is suggested as a way to avoid curtailment and provide stored fuel for backup generation.

International parallels and politics

• Similar north–south transmission and NIMBY problems are reported in Germany and Norway, with debates over buried vs overhead lines and regional price differences.
• Norwegian interconnects raised local prices and volatility, prompting political backlash despite system‑wide benefits.
• Several commenters argue that current “market” setups plus local opposition systematically under‑deliver on needed grid infrastructure for renewables.