Cost of curtailment hits £1bn

More than £1 billion has been spent to far this year in paying wind farms to turn off and increase generation from gas plants, according to new data.

The Wasted Wind tracker said that Britain reached the milestone two months earlier than in 2025, with costs in 2026 £300m higher than this time last year due to electricity generated in Scotland not being able to be moved to where the demand is.

Wasted Wind said constraint costs could increase to £3.2bn over the next 12 months, while the government has warned they could reach up to £10bn by 2030.

The most expensive day so far this year was on 2nd July, when £21m was paid out to wind and gas generators in constraint payments in a single day.

Greg Jackson, CEO of Octopus Energy which is behind the Wind Tracker project, said the figures highlighted the importance of changing the electricity market to a zonal pricing system.

However, Ecotricity founder Dale Vince said that last year Britain “used 97% of the wind generated and could not use just 3%”.

“The grid is being built and in the meantime we only have 97% of the benefit - that’s the story,” he said.