Great power, great responsibility: Assessing power sector policy for the UK’s net zero target

Abstract

UK power sector decarbonisation is an important step toward achieving the country’s 2050 net zero target. Two uncertainties are particularly relevant to this effort: future electricity demand and biomass availability, the latter due to the potential for negative emissions in the power sector from biomass energy with carbon capture and storage. Using the dynamic simulation model FTT:Power, this work explores the impacts of different power sector policy portfolios on emissions, electricity prices, and government spending under these uncertainties. It finds that deep decarbonisation of the UK power sector is possible, including substantial negative emissions, but that this will require ambitious and diversified policy. Carbon pricing is found to be the single most important decarbonisation policy instrument. Direct regulatory phase-out of unabated fossil fuel power generation is similarly crucial for power sector decarbonisation, and for building resilience to biomass availability uncertainty. That said, under all policy portfolios biomass availability plays a key role in enabling net negative emissions in the power sector. This suggests the importance of securing and improving UK biomass supply, and of decarbonisation outside the power sector to reduce the need for negative emissions to begin with.