Great Britain braced to pay millions for backup electricity during solar eclipse

Event expected to curtail solar power just as summer’s fifth heatwave increases use of air conditioning and fans Great Britain is braced to pay millions for backup electricity supplies to prevent a shortfall on Wednesday evening as the near-total solar eclipse is expected to wipe out solar power generation. The government’s electricity grid operator is expected to make multimillion-pound payments to secure electricity at short notice before the moon blocks up to 95% of the sun over parts of the country, the most dramatic solar eclipse visible in Great Britain since 1999. Gas plants are among the generators that are expected to claim payments of more than four times the market price after the grid operator raised an official alarm that it expects there will not be adequate power generation on Wednesday evening. The Connah’s Quay gas plant in Flintshire, owned by the German utility company Uniper, agreed to generate electricity on Wednesday afternoon for a price of £875 per megawatt-hour, compared with the market price of just below £212/MWh for this evening. The payment suggests that the gas plant may be kept running through the evening to help meet the rising demand for electricity