A snapshot (or nine) of energy
Globally and nationally, the energy picture is complex. We’ve pulled together a rough sketch with just a few of the charts from the library we've collected in the mass of reports we read each month.
Wherever we look, someone or other has produced a report on energy. Whether you prefer it in metric or imperial, there’s ton(ne)s of work going on. And, all over the place, we see signs and signals calling for skills solutions.
We couldn’t hope to tell the full story on The Green Edge without maxing out Substack’s servers. So instead, here are a few snapshots that we hope paints a rough sketch of the overall picture and indicates the path we’re all heading down with increasing scale and pace.
The world’s energy has changed…
Share of cumulative power capacity (%) by technology, 2010-2027. Source: IEA
This global chart from the International Energy Agency shows the steady decline of both coal and gas, and the rapid growth of renewable energy sources. There is no going back. We are indeed heading towards a green energy world.
…and that includes us here in the UK
Share of GB electricity by source. Image: TGE from CarbonBrief
We liked this set of interactive images from CarbonBrief and hope they’ll forgive us for taking a few screengrabs. We see a similar picture to the world snapshot, but still shows gas being pretty significant. Coal, on the other hand, looks soon to be history.
We also see the growth of jobs a-plenty. Skills intelligence surveys by the Offshore Wind Industry Council (OWIC) forecasts – directly and indirectly – 100,000 people will be needed to serve the offshore wind industry by 2030. We also know from OWIC that there are multiple skills shortages: health and safety; specialist engineers (turbine and protection engineering); digital skills and digital specialists (data analysts, robotics); advanced manufacturing; project managers; electrical skills (senior authorised persons, high voltage skills, SCADA, cable-jointing and grid connection); marine skills; policy and regulation (public and private sector e.g. consenting and environmental). We also see big gaps in project management and digital for engineering, while in the longer term there are continuing skills issues around graduate technicians, STEM skills, and decommissioning skills.
The biggest single gap? Welders, believe it or not, so for anyone handy with their hands and looking for promising prospects, quit the Flash Dancing and pick up that torch.
Longer term projections point to high capital expenditure
Electricity generation mix to 2035 (central scenario). Source: CCC/AFRY
Of course, it’s not just wind. We can see from this chart from the Climate Change Committee (CCC) the relative shares for the other renewable technologies - including nuclear power, which Jeremy Hunt confirmed in the recent Spring Budget (subject to consultation) is “classed as ‘environmentally sustainable’ in our green taxonomy”. That’s good, then, we suppose.
But here’s an important point. Most of the other renewable technologies are high capital industries and require long term planning and development. Ideally, this should allow education and training providers to prepare accordingly. We’re already seeing aspects of this, with the major offshore wind developers and operators engaging with local colleges and supporting the recruitment and training of apprentices.
Huge amounts of green energy are waiting in the wings
Wind and solar projects waiting to be connected to the grid in Europe and the US. Source: BloombergNEF and others.
If there’s any doubt that project managers, engineers, technicians and operators are needed in spades, this chart should dispel that doubt. And let’s be clear – these are projects waiting to be connected to the grid! BloombergNEF tells us there’s almost 1,000 gigawatts of solar projects and 500 gigawatts of wind stuck in the interconnection queue across the US and Europe. That’s close to four times the amount of new solar capacity and five times the amount of wind installed around the world in 2022.
We might even have TOO MUCH renewable energy
Bet you’d never thought The Green Edge would say something like that! Well, not exactly too much, but, even down to individual building levels, solar offers real opportunities and as solar technology progresses, panels don’t just have to be installed on the roof but are starting to emerge in other guises, such as wall cladding. We’re indebted to our friend Kevin Holland of the Solar Shed for this picture…
Image: The Solar Shed
The more this kind of thing happens, the more potential for topping up the grid to a levels beyond what it actually needs at any given time. Which brings us to…
Air, salt and battery
Pardon the awful pun, we’re talking about energy storage here. Many techniques have been proposed, tried and tested over the years, including compressed air, molten salt storage and, of course, batteries. This 2020 post from GTM narrows down the list of potentially viable technologies to just five, while the chart below from the IEA focuses on the projected growth of concentrated solar power, pumped hydro and utility-scale batteries.
Source: IEA
BloombergNEF’s top ten energy storage trends in 2023 also talks about pumped hydro – a mature technology, remember – making a comeback, although most of BNEF’s other trends are related to batteries and the battery supply chain. Using batteries for grid energy storage by is only a fraction of the overall picture, of course; McKinsey tells us that Li-on battery demand is expected to grow by around 33% annually to 2030…
Source: McKinsey.
…while REGlobal and BNEF (again) tell us that the big issue around making all these batteries will be the supply constraints…
Source: REGlobal/BloombergNEF
For sure, the new geopolitics of battery manufacture will be one of the major disrupters of our age, particular as the ‘old’ geopolitics of the hydrocarbon supply chain wind down, or at least morph in some way. But, while it remains to be seen how the whole battery supply chain will pan out, and while initiatives like the Faraday Battery Challenge hunt for ever more cost effective, higher performing, longer living, safer and sustainable batteries, battery-related skills – as we reported in last week’s post – are becoming increasingly-well defined, with the European Allbatts project defining 26 skills cards (so far) for battery occupations.
It’s not just energy…
Finally, let’s not forget this is about heat too. We liked this recent piece in the FT which described a pioneering communal ground source heat pump scheme in the Cornish village of Stithians. Dubbed Heat the Streets, the scheme has drilled deep bore holes (100m) where liquid can absorb heat at a constant 10C-12C. The result is 30 to 40% more efficient than the air-source version. 270 Stithians residents applied to join the under-street grid, paying £3,500 for the heat pump plus a few thousand more for installation and a monthly standing charge of £25, all on top of the energy usage charge of around £130 per month. Sounds a lot? We’ll see.
