Grids need several times more money than renewables, says ScottishPower chief
Failure to invest in electricity grids will cost countries dearly, not just in terms of their renewables rollout but also for their economies, warns chief of Iberdrola unit
Electricity grids have fallen so far behind they now need several times more investment than renewables to avoid hobbling green goals, said ScottishPower chief Keith Anderson, who also explained what the energy transition could learn from the iPad.
Over the last four or five years in Europe, Anderson said that governments have “woken up to the fact” that they need to invest in grids.
“It’s not particularly sexy. It’s difficult for a politician to get a great PR photograph standing under a pylon. But it’s absolutely bloody essential.”
Anderson, who is CEO at ScottishPower, a subsidiary of Spanish renewables giant Iberdrola, was speaking at a BloombergNEF summit today in London.
“You end up with investors, whether it’s data centres or gigafactories, saying I want to invest in your country but I can’t get a good connection,” said Anderson. “That's the kind of thing that really woke up politicians to the fact that it is so critical.”
Anderson noted calls for every pound that is spent on renewables to be matched by a pound spent on grids. “Right now it's actually more than that because I think the grid has fallen behind the development of renewables in a lot of countries.”
“So actually, I think right now we should be spending three or four pounds for every pound spent on renewables,” he said.
The UK needs to spend £60bn ($79bn) “rewiring to build a grid fit for the future,” said Anderson.
“If you want economic growth, if you want houses, if you want jobs, if you want manufacturing, if you want data centres, if you want to be a leader in AI technology, if you want gigafactories and you want to switch to EVs, bloody hell, you'd better build a grid fit for that. Because otherwise, you're not going to get any of it.”
Anderson also spoke of the role of ScottishPower in helping the switch to clean technologies such as heat pumps and electric vehicles, stressing that consumers “need to see” that green power is cheaper.
“We need to make it the obvious choice for the customer,” he said. “So when they go to look at buying a new car, why in God’s name would they not buy an electric one.”
He compared the need to persuade people to adopt heat pumps and EVs to the rollout of Apple’s iPad. “Who the hell ever needed an iPad? Then you got one and you couldn’t live without it.”
“You need to make it that simple and that easy.”
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