Carbon intensity is a measure of how clean our electricity is. Specifically, how many grams of carbon dioxide are released to produce a kilowatt hour of electricity. Fossil fuels are very carbon intensive, whereas renewable energy is carbon-free. This gauge shows, in real time, the carbon intensity of Great Britain’s electricity, which is made up of a range of sources.
Great Britain has the fastest-decarbonising electricity network of any nation in the world. But we’re on a journey and this graph shows how we have reduced the carbon intensity of our electricity in the decade or so. Scroll to see details on weekly data - dark black indicates months where fossil fuels dominated the generation mix, whilst light grey or white show when we have been running on clean energy.
Where does Great Britain’s electricity come from? The current generation mix shows what power sources have been running on the system in the last 30 minutes.
Carbon Emissions
This graph shows the carbon emissions produced by each fuel that is currently running on Britain’s electricity system. You can see that fossil fuels produce way more carbon emissions than renewable generation.
National Grid ESO’s job is to keep the demand and supply of electricity in perfect balance. This graph shows the difference between the carbon intensity of all the generators in the balancing mechanism before and after our balancing actions have been applied. Use the slider to zoom in for a detailed look at particular time periods.
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