Analysis
Europe’s grid is running out of room for the power it already makes
Wind and solar farms are being paid to switch off while cities wait years for a connection. The bottleneck is not generation. It is copper, permits and a system built for coal.
Energy correspondent
12 min read
Transmission lines outside Lyon. Europe added record solar capacity this year, but much of it cannot reach the grid.
On a sunny Sunday in May, electricity prices in parts of Europe fell below zero for nine hours. Solar farms were producing more power than the grid could carry, and operators paid them to stop.
That same week, a data centre, a steel plant and 4,000 new homes were told they would have to wait up to seven years for a grid connection.
A system built backwards
Europe’s grid was designed around a few large power stations close to cities. Renewable energy arrives from thousands of small sites, often far from where it is needed. Moving it requires new lines, and new lines take a decade to build.
The queue of projects waiting to connect now exceeds 1,500 gigawatts, more than twice the continent’s current peak demand.
“We are not short of clean power. We are short of wires,” a grid operator told Pressio.
Where the delays come from
Permits for new transmission lines take an average of eight years.
Transformers now have delivery times of up to four years.
Grid operators are funded for maintenance, not expansion.
What would help
Operators and analysts point to faster permitting, standardised equipment and smarter use of existing lines, such as sensors that allow higher loads on cool, windy days. None is as dramatic as a new wind farm. All would matter more.
Topics
Mara Ellison
Energy correspondent
Mara covers power grids, energy prices and the politics of the transition from Brussels.
