Ofgem announces £62.8 million to deliver smarter energy network
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Ofgem has announced funding of £62.8 million for nine innovation projects as part of its revolutionary innovation competition to deliver smarter energy network for consumers. The funding is provided under Ofgem’s Network Innovation Competition (NIC), which encourages energy network companies to enhance innovation to reduce costs for consumer while helping deliver a low carbon future. When combined with additional contributions from the companies and external funding this will see over £100 million being invested in innovation.
In total, there was £99 million of NIC funding available for the eleven projects which had applied for funding under the schemes. However, Ofgem could not be confident that all projects clearly demonstrated good value to customers at this stage, resulting in two missing out on funding this year.
Successful projects this year include:
Developing a commercially viable facility that can process waste, convert it to gas and distribute it through the existing gas network to consumers.
Delivering solutions to manage excessive temperatures at distribution substations, allowing better use to be made of existing assets and reducing long-term costs for consumers.
Testing new designs of pylons that are smaller, better for the environment and can be used in rural and difficult to access areas.
Working with Leeds City Council to test arrangements to power some of their refuse collection vehicles using gas from the network.
Source: Ofgem
