Britain’s gas supply has reached ‘concerningly low’ levels and could run out in a matter of days after an Arctic blast sent temperatures plunging.
The icy weather over the last few days has seen demand for gas-fired power stations skyrocket, energy firm Centrica said.
Now it’s feared a fresh blast of freezing weather – which could see temperatures drop to a bone-chilling -20C – could trigger an energy crisis.
The United Kingdom heavily relies on natural gas to heat the homes of many Britons during the cold winter months. Additionally, a substantial amount of natural gas is used to generate electricity across the country.
But as of Thursday, storage sites across the UK were 26 per cent down on last year’s supply, leaving them around ‘half full’, Centrica said.
‘This means the UK has less than a week of gas demand in store,’ the energy giant warned.
It comes as the nation came ‘within a whisker’ of wide-scale blackouts earlier this week, in its closest shave since 2011.
The government has downplayed the imminent crisis, assuring the public of adequate gas supply and electricity capacity for the winter. A spokesperson from 10 Downing Street stated, “We believe we will have enough gas and electricity to meet the winter demand, thanks to our diverse and robust energy system.”
The levels of natural gas supply in Britain have dropped to concerning lows after a period of freezing weather and snowfall. (Pictured: Individuals walking through the snow on Thursday)
Freezing conditions have seen Britain hit by snow storms, with temperatures in some areas plunging to a bitter -17C (pictured is snow covering a vehicle in Buxton on Thursday)
Despite being full ahead of winter, current gas inventory at Rough, the country’s largest gas storage site (pictured), is 20 per cent lower than at the same time last year
‘We speak regularly with the National Energy System Operator to monitor our energy security and ensure they have all tools at their disposal – if needed – to secure our supply.
Gas storage was already lower than usual heading into December as a result of the early onset of winter.
Combined with stubbornly high gas prices, this has meant that it has been more difficult to top up storage over Christmas.
This, combined with the ongoing icy conditions and the end of Russian gas pipeline supplies through Ukraine on December 31, has meant that gas inventory across the UK are now reaching crisis levels.
Despite being full ahead of winter, current gas inventory at Rough, the country’s largest gas storage site, which is operated by Centrica, is 20 per cent lower than at the same time last year.
Rough has played a crucial role so far this winter by supplying almost 420 million cubic meters (mcm) of gas since early November, enough to heat three million homes every day.
‘The UK’s gas storage levels are concerningly low. We are an outlier from the rest of Europe when it comes to the role of storage in our energy system and we are now seeing the implications of that’ Chris O’Shea, Centrica’s group chief executive said.
‘Energy storage is what keeps the lights on and homes warm when the sun doesn’t shine and the wind doesn’t blow, so investing in our storage capacity makes perfect economic sense. We need to think of storage as a very valuable insurance policy.’
Temperatures plunged well into the minus figures on Thursday evening
Skiers are seen at Glenshee Ski Centre on January 07, 2025 in Glenshee amid the icy weather
Heavy snow has covered much of the UK in recent days. Pictured is Saddleworth’s high street
The news comes after the UK came ‘within a whisker of blackouts’ on Wednesday after plunging temperatures and low wind power generation left grid operators scrambling to keep the lights on.
Surplus electricity capacity on the national grid had plummeted to just 580 megawatts (MW) by 5.30pm, according to data platform Amira.
One expert warned the energy reserves were so low that even an outage at a ‘relatively small’ power station risked causing blackouts.
Kathryn Porter, an independent energy consultant, said: ‘On January 8, the GB power market came within a whisker of blackouts. Neso used almost every last megawatt available.
‘This should be a real wake-up call about the dangers of relying on weather-based generation.’
Yesterday, the National Energy System Operator (Neso) pushed back at the claims, insisting that ‘at no point’ were power supplies close to failing.
It said it had been holding onto around 1.4 gigawatts of emergency reserves which went unused on Wednesday.
Craig Dyke, Neso’s director of system operations, said: ‘Neso operates Great Britain’s electricity network to one of the highest levels of safety and reliability anywhere in the world.
‘Yesterday our control room engineers used our standard operational tools to manage the electricity network and ensure that we maintained enough electricity for our standard operating contingency.
‘At no point were electricity supplies less than anticipated demand and our engineers were able to rebalance the system without the need to consider emergency measures.’
This is a breaking news story. Updates to follow.
