Scotland’s output of renewable electricity rose 55.3% year on year for the three months to September 2022, on the back of an annual 11.4% rise in clean generation capacity, now standing at 13.6 GWp.
Just over 6.2GWh of renewable power was produced in the quarter to September 2022.
New statistics issued by Holyrood’s SNP-Green government show that fully 57.0% of Scotland’s electricity generated in 2021 was from wind, solar and hydro. Adding nuclear pushed that figure to 87.8% for all low carbon sources.
Subtracting net exports going south of the border pushed Scotland’s renewable penetration of consumption to an even more impressive 85.2% of all electricity used in the country.
In contrast England and Wales combined could reach only 36.2% from renewables alone, and 48.7% with nuclear factored in.
Lorna Slater MSP, one of two Scottish Green ministers in the SNP-led government, is pictured in a solar farm north of Edinburgh.
Over the first nine months of 2022, generation was up 34.7% compared to the same period in 2021, thanks to increased wind, increased rain, and developers adding that new infrastructure.
Higher wind speeds resulted in wind generation being 39.4% higher in 2022’s three quarters to September, compared to the same period in 2021
Wind power, up 46.2% on the same period in 2021, amounted to 19,376 GWh of electricity. Higher rainfall boosted hydro output, up 5.3% year on year.
Electricity consumed in Scotland barely changed between 2021 and 2020. Homes used 5.8% less, counterbalanced by a 6.3% rise in workplaces and industry. Gas consumption fell by 3.3% over the same period, with decreases in both sectors.
As of three months ago, Scotland counted an astonishing 397 renewable projects in the nation’s pipeline, with a cumulative capacity of 17.1 GW. Fully 3.4 GW of these are under construction, most of them wind farms off the Moray Firth. 6.8 GW are awaiting construction and 6.9 GW are in planning.
