Price spike (low wind)
Research notes
Figures are for London unless they say otherwise.
What happened
- Tue 7 Feb: London peaked at 35.8p at 06:30, average 32.6p, lowest 24.9p at 00:00; highest anywhere 43.8p in Northern Scotland.
Likely causes
- Tue 7 Feb, 06:30 (London's peak): wind 2.6GW (8% of supply), solar 0GW, gas 19.1GW (56%), imports 2.9GW, total supply 34.1GW. Over the day wind averaged 3.9GW; the 2023 average was 9GW (29%). Source: NESO historic generation mix. (figures confirmed by source; link to prices is inference)
- Wind was less than half its yearly average at the peak on Tue 7 Feb (2.6GW, against 9GW for the year), so gas made up the gap. (inference from NESO data)
- Elexon market index: Tue 7 Feb averaged £169.82/MWh with a high of £264.65 at 07:30. Source: Elexon market index, Tue 7 Feb. (confirmed by source; a short-term index, not the day-ahead auction Agile follows)
Wider context that week
- The Energy Price Guarantee began on 1 Oct 2022, setting household electricity unit rates at 34.0p/kWh. Source: Solar Power Portal, 2022. Octopus applied it to Agile by charging 34p for any half-hour priced 34p to 52p before VAT and taking 17p off anything above, which is why so many half-hours from then to 30 Jun 2023 sit at exactly 35.8p (34p with VAT) and the highest at 82.1p. (confirmed by data in the site's store; see
src/lib/events.mjs)
Confidence
Medium. The grid figures fit the prices, but no report found names a cause for this date.
Gaps
- No news report or official write-up found that ties this date to a cause; the causes above are from the data.
- Elexon's system warnings feed has no entries before mid-2023, so warnings for these days couldn't be checked there.