Live data · Great Britain
See how Britain is generating electricity
Demand, generation by fuel, imports and carbon intensity reconciled into one transparent half-hour view.
Contains BMRS data © Elexon Limited copyright and database right 2026. Carbon intensity from the National Energy System Operator and the University of Oxford, licensed under CC BY 4.0. Demand and interconnector data from NESO under the NESO Open Data Licence.
Great Britain
Latest half-hour
Half-hour ending · 29 minutes old
Latest interval complete. All inputs needed for this half-hour were available when the figures were calculated.
24,541 MW
National demand · actual
28,806 MW
Metered plus estimated embedded
59.5%
Share of GB generation, not imports
122 gCO₂/kWh
Actual national intensity
3,178 MW
Positive means electricity entering GB
£135.4/MWh
Provisional MID indicator, not a supplier purchase price
What stands out right now
One thing is unusual about this half-hour
Solar is supplying about 20.3% of the mix.
At 5.9 GW, solar is doing a substantial share of the work. Most of it sits on rooftops and small ground-mounted sites rather than on the transmission system, so it shows up as demand that never appears rather than as metered generation.
These notes are generated from the figures on this page by fixed rules, with a stated threshold behind each one. They are not written or checked by an editor before publication, and nothing appears here unless the underlying measurement was actually reported.
Latest interval
Generation by source
Generation only · imports excluded
- Metered wind7,498 MW26.0%
- Gas (CCGT)7,277 MW25.3%
- Embedded solar (estimated)5,851 MW20.3%
- Nuclear3,779 MW13.1%
- Biomass2,497 MW8.7%
- Embedded wind (estimated)1,097 MW3.8%
- Other765 MW2.7%
- Hydro199 MW0.7%
- Gas (OCGT)8 MW0.0%
- Oil0 MW0.0%
- Coal0 MW0.0%
Biomass is counted as renewable under the current calculation policy. Pumped storage is shown as output, not primary generation.
Cross-border power
Interconnector flows
Positive values are imports into Great Britain. Negative values are exports from Great Britain.
- BritNed · Netherlands504 MWImporting
- East–West0 MWImporting
- ElecLink · France318 MWImporting
- Greenlink494 MWExporting
- IFA · France1,048 MWImporting
- IFA2 · France379 MWImporting
- Moyle349 MWExporting
- Nemo Link · Belgium130 MWImporting
- North Sea Link · Norway1,397 MWImporting
- Viking Link · Denmark246 MWImporting
Declared position · not metered
Battery storage
11 Aug 2026, 18:00 BST · 108 of 114 units
The fleet is currently discharging. Batteries charge when power is cheap and plentiful, and discharge into the evening peak.
- Discharging
- 483 MW
- Charging
- 0 MW
- Net
- 483 MW
- Registered capacity
- 6,035 MW
Across the last 48 half hours the fleet peaked at 731 MW charging and 1,564 MW discharging.
Elexon publishes no battery fuel type, so these figures are built from physical notifications — the position each operator declared for the half hour — aggregated over 114 balancing-mechanism units identified as batteries. They are a declared intention rather than a meter reading, and are deliberately excluded from the generation mix above. This covers batteries registered in the balancing mechanism, not every grid-scale battery in Great Britain: capacity that is not registered, or that trades through an aggregator unit, sits outside the figures on this panel.
Half-hour history
11 August 2026
36 of 48 intervals
Demand and generation
Same MW scale; generation includes estimated embedded wind and solar.
Carbon intensity
Actual and forecast remain separate on one gCO₂/kWh scale.
Short-term and system prices
Provisional £/MWh indicators. MID is not the price every supplier paid.
View exact half-hour figures
| Interval | Demand | Generation | Carbon actual | Carbon forecast | Market index | System buy | System sell |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 22,771 MW | 17,128 MW | 174 gCO₂/kWh | 202 gCO₂/kWh | £135.4/MWh | £120.7/MWh | £120.7/MWh | |
| 21,968 MW | 15,989 MW | 169 gCO₂/kWh | 204 gCO₂/kWh | £141.7/MWh | £164.0/MWh | £164.0/MWh | |
| 21,589 MW | 15,374 MW | 168 gCO₂/kWh | 172 gCO₂/kWh | £140.4/MWh | £164.0/MWh | £164.0/MWh | |
| 21,689 MW | 15,542 MW | 169 gCO₂/kWh | 173 gCO₂/kWh | £140.3/MWh | £119.7/MWh | £119.7/MWh | |
| 21,004 MW | 15,355 MW | 170 gCO₂/kWh | 174 gCO₂/kWh | £141.5/MWh | £164.0/MWh | £164.0/MWh | |
| 20,991 MW | 15,231 MW | 168 gCO₂/kWh | 173 gCO₂/kWh | £134.6/MWh | £113.1/MWh | £113.1/MWh | |
| 19,774 MW | 14,690 MW | 166 gCO₂/kWh | 170 gCO₂/kWh | £139.5/MWh | £164.0/MWh | £164.0/MWh | |
| 19,811 MW | 14,612 MW | 170 gCO₂/kWh | 165 gCO₂/kWh | £135.6/MWh | £164.0/MWh | £164.0/MWh | |
| 19,416 MW | 15,228 MW | 169 gCO₂/kWh | 159 gCO₂/kWh | £149.8/MWh | £164.0/MWh | £164.0/MWh | |
| 19,587 MW | 15,474 MW | 163 gCO₂/kWh | 154 gCO₂/kWh | £141.8/MWh | £117.5/MWh | £117.5/MWh | |
| 19,502 MW | 15,960 MW | 161 gCO₂/kWh | 134 gCO₂/kWh | £151.0/MWh | £164.0/MWh | £164.0/MWh | |
| 19,614 MW | 16,231 MW | 163 gCO₂/kWh | 108 gCO₂/kWh | £151.1/MWh | £161.7/MWh | £161.7/MWh | |
| 21,366 MW | 17,106 MW | 165 gCO₂/kWh | 165 gCO₂/kWh | £148.1/MWh | £121.5/MWh | £121.5/MWh | |
| 22,054 MW | Not available | 158 gCO₂/kWh | 165 gCO₂/kWh | £153.3/MWh | £131.9/MWh | £131.9/MWh | |
| 23,131 MW | Not available | 148 gCO₂/kWh | 155 gCO₂/kWh | £153.9/MWh | £165.0/MWh | £165.0/MWh | |
| 23,967 MW | Not available | 138 gCO₂/kWh | 153 gCO₂/kWh | £145.8/MWh | £118.9/MWh | £118.9/MWh | |
| 23,968 MW | Not available | 124 gCO₂/kWh | 139 gCO₂/kWh | £145.9/MWh | £106.7/MWh | £106.7/MWh | |
| 23,048 MW | 22,276 MW | 108 gCO₂/kWh | 131 gCO₂/kWh | £143.0/MWh | £101.2/MWh | £101.2/MWh | |
| 22,254 MW | 22,890 MW | 93 gCO₂/kWh | 110 gCO₂/kWh | £135.2/MWh | £100.0/MWh | £100.0/MWh | |
| 21,283 MW | 23,504 MW | 76 gCO₂/kWh | 99 gCO₂/kWh | £130.1/MWh | £98.1/MWh | £98.1/MWh | |
| 19,957 MW | 23,645 MW | 66 gCO₂/kWh | 81 gCO₂/kWh | £124.8/MWh | £90.0/MWh | £90.0/MWh | |
| 19,234 MW | 23,824 MW | 61 gCO₂/kWh | 76 gCO₂/kWh | £120.3/MWh | £83.8/MWh | £83.8/MWh | |
| 18,750 MW | 24,606 MW | 57 gCO₂/kWh | 61 gCO₂/kWh | £93.5/MWh | £76.0/MWh | £76.0/MWh | |
| 18,035 MW | 24,767 MW | 56 gCO₂/kWh | 61 gCO₂/kWh | £91.2/MWh | £76.0/MWh | £76.0/MWh | |
| 17,828 MW | 25,134 MW | 54 gCO₂/kWh | 52 gCO₂/kWh | £86.4/MWh | £76.0/MWh | £76.0/MWh | |
| 17,299 MW | 25,480 MW | 52 gCO₂/kWh | 52 gCO₂/kWh | £88.1/MWh | £76.0/MWh | £76.0/MWh | |
| 17,209 MW | 25,601 MW | 52 gCO₂/kWh | 49 gCO₂/kWh | £86.4/MWh | £70.0/MWh | £70.0/MWh | |
| 17,263 MW | 25,578 MW | 53 gCO₂/kWh | 49 gCO₂/kWh | £85.4/MWh | £70.0/MWh | £70.0/MWh | |
| 17,266 MW | 25,812 MW | 52 gCO₂/kWh | 48 gCO₂/kWh | £84.7/MWh | £157.0/MWh | £157.0/MWh | |
| 17,674 MW | 25,777 MW | 52 gCO₂/kWh | 50 gCO₂/kWh | £90.2/MWh | £119.6/MWh | £119.6/MWh | |
| 18,353 MW | 25,842 MW | 54 gCO₂/kWh | 52 gCO₂/kWh | £95.7/MWh | £66.0/MWh | £66.0/MWh | |
| 19,290 MW | 25,630 MW | 56 gCO₂/kWh | 55 gCO₂/kWh | £90.5/MWh | £66.0/MWh | £66.0/MWh | |
| 20,246 MW | 25,555 MW | 71 gCO₂/kWh | 53 gCO₂/kWh | £92.6/MWh | £66.0/MWh | £66.0/MWh | |
| 21,844 MW | 25,606 MW | 95 gCO₂/kWh | 61 gCO₂/kWh | £92.8/MWh | £66.0/MWh | £66.0/MWh | |
| 23,025 MW | 28,261 MW | 109 gCO₂/kWh | 74 gCO₂/kWh | £142.4/MWh | £127.4/MWh | £127.4/MWh | |
| 24,541 MW | 28,806 MW | 122 gCO₂/kWh | 79 gCO₂/kWh | £135.4/MWh | £98.1/MWh | £98.1/MWh |
399 days
Carbon intensity, day by day
Each bar spans the cleanest and dirtiest half hour of its day; the line is the daily mean. A day that averages 120 but ranges from 40 to 300 is a different day from one that held steady, and an average alone would not show it.
gCO₂/kWh. Only days that reconciled in full are drawn — 1 of 400 in this window are partly collected and are left out rather than plotted as a dip that did not happen.
Averages over time
How this compares with the recent record
Each figure is a mean over the complete half hours in its window. Intervals where a fuel or a flow was not published are excluded rather than counted as zero, so every period states how much of itself it is based on. The reconciled record here begins on 1 January 2019 — earlier than that is not missing data, it is simply outside what has been collected, and the records further down draw on a longer published series instead.
Past day
44 of 48 half hours · 91.7% of the window · from 10 August 2026 · calculated
- Price
- £129.6/MWh
- Emissions
- 132 g/kWh
- Demand
- 21,891 MW
- Generation
- 21,832 MW
- Net imports
- 6,543 MW
Battery 479 MW discharging against 143 MW charging, over 48 half hours. Declared position, not metered, and not part of the mix below.
- Gas (CCGT)6,196 MW38.0%
- Nuclear3,789 MW23.3%
- Metered wind3,098 MW19.0%
- Biomass2,211 MW13.6%
- Other677 MW4.2%
- Hydro322 MW2.0%
- Gas (OCGT)3 MW0.0%
- Oil0 MW0.0%
- Coal0 MW0.0%
- Pumped storage-58 MW0.0%
Past week
332 of 336 half hours · 98.8% of the window · from 4 August 2026 · calculated
- Price
- £103.7/MWh
- Emissions
- 105 g/kWh
- Demand
- 20,816 MW
- Generation
- 24,525 MW
- Net imports
- 2,710 MW
Battery 287 MW discharging against 199 MW charging, over 291 half hours. Declared position, not metered, and not part of the mix below.
- Metered wind6,713 MW35.2%
- Gas (CCGT)5,330 MW27.9%
- Nuclear3,885 MW20.4%
- Biomass2,184 MW11.4%
- Other720 MW3.8%
- Hydro229 MW1.2%
- Gas (OCGT)11 MW0.1%
- Oil0 MW0.0%
- Coal0 MW0.0%
- Pumped storage-120 MW0.0%
Past year
17,516 of 17,520 half hours · 100.0% of the window · from 11 August 2025 · calculated
- Price
- £86.8/MWh
- Emissions
- 125 g/kWh
- Demand
- 26,106 MW
- Generation
- 28,303 MW
- Net imports
- 3,183 MW
Battery 280 MW discharging against 217 MW charging, over 375 half hours. Declared position, not metered, and not part of the mix below.
- Metered wind8,667 MW36.1%
- Gas (CCGT)8,367 MW34.8%
- Nuclear3,609 MW15.0%
- Biomass2,269 MW9.4%
- Other669 MW2.8%
- Hydro420 MW1.7%
- Gas (OCGT)25 MW0.1%
- Oil0 MW0.0%
- Coal0 MW0.0%
- Pumped storage-56 MW0.0%
Whole stored recordsince 1 January 2019
131,911 of 133,426 half hours · 98.9% of the window · from 1 January 2019 · calculated
- Price
- £91.3/MWh
- Emissions
- 163 g/kWh
- Demand
- 26,972 MW
- Generation
- 28,722 MW
- Net imports
- 2,462 MW
Battery 280 MW discharging against 217 MW charging, over 375 half hours. Declared position, not metered, and not part of the mix below.
- Gas (CCGT)10,600 MW42.0%
- Metered wind6,803 MW26.9%
- Nuclear4,770 MW18.9%
- Biomass1,992 MW7.9%
- Hydro400 MW1.6%
- Coal354 MW1.4%
- Other319 MW1.3%
- Gas (OCGT)21 MW0.1%
- Oil0 MW0.0%
- Pumped storage-61 MW0.0%
Since January 2009
Records
- Most wind
- 23.88 GW
- 25 March 2026
- Most solar
- 16.29 GW
- 23 April 2026
- Cleanest half hour
- 19 g/kWh
- 15 April 2024
When British wind first reached
| Output | First reached | Actual |
|---|---|---|
| 23.00 GW | 5 December 2025 | 23,070 MW |
| 22.00 GW | 15 December 2024 | 22,061 MW |
| 21.00 GW | 10 January 2023 | 21,001 MW |
| 20.00 GW | 2 November 2022 | 20,304 MW |
| 18.00 GW | 28 March 2021 | 18,008 MW |
| 15.00 GW | 18 December 2018 | 15,000 MW |
| 10.00 GW | 23 December 2016 | 10,040 MW |
| 5.00 GW | 7 November 2012 | 5,031 MW |
Levels not yet reached are absent rather than listed as pending, so this table never advertises a record that has not happened.
NESO Historic GB Generation Mix, 308,715 half hours from 1 January 2009. Half-hourly from January 2009. Wind is metered plus embedded generation; a metered-only series peaks at 18.4 GW and would not carry these figures.This is NESO’s published series rather than the half-hourly reconciliation used elsewhere on this page, because only it reaches back far enough for a record to mean anything. Last calculated .
United Kingdom · not Great Britain
The end of coal
Coal generated 137.8TWh of the United Kingdom’s electricity in 2006 and 0 TWh in 2025. The last coal-fired power station in Great Britain closed on 30 September 2024, which is why coal reads zero in every figure above.
- 1997110.1 TWh
- 1998112.9 TWh
- 199997.4 TWh
- 2000111.8 TWh
- 2001121.3 TWh
- 2002115.4 TWh
- 2003127.7 TWh
- 2004121.9 TWh
- 2005124.8 TWh
- 2006137.8 TWh
- 2007125.4 TWh
- 2008114.2 TWh
- 200994.3 TWh
- 201098.6 TWh
- 201199.4 TWh
- 2012132.7 TWh
- 2013123.5 TWh
- 201495 TWh
- 201571.9 TWh
- 201629.1 TWh
- 201721.3 TWh
- 201815.9 TWh
- 20196.5 TWh
- 20205.2 TWh
- 20216 TWh
- 20225.1 TWh
- 20233.1 TWh
- 20241.6 TWh
- 20250 TWh
DESNZ Energy Trends 5.4. United Kingdom including Northern Ireland, so not directly comparable with the Great Britain figures above. Only complete calendar years are shown, so a year still being published does not appear as a fall that has not happened.
United Kingdom history, separate from the live Great Britain view
Fifty years of fuel used to generate electricity
These published histories cover the United Kingdom, including Northern Ireland. They are kept below and off the axes of the live Great Britain data above.
The annual lines are DUKES figures in Mtoe. They describe fuel used for generation, not electricity delivered. Energy Trends owns monthly and quarterly observations; DUKES owns annual observations. The grains are never spliced into one line.
Supply and consumption in the latest complete DUKES year
These annual TWh series have their own unit and definition; they are not added to the fuel-input chart.
- Domestic consumption
- 96.2 TWh
- 2025 · United Kingdom
- Electricity supplied net
- 278.8 TWh
- 2025 · United Kingdom
- Industrial consumption
- 76.7 TWh
- 2025 · United Kingdom
- Total electricity consumed
- 280.2 TWh
- 2025 · United Kingdom
Fuel used in the latest Energy Trends month
Monthly fuel inputs are individual Energy Trends columns in Mtoe. They remain separate from the quarterly category table and the annual DUKES lines.
- Bioenergy
- 0.5 Mtoe
- 2026-05 · United Kingdom
- Coal
- 0 Mtoe
- 2026-05 · United Kingdom
- Gas
- 1 Mtoe
- 2026-05 · United Kingdom
- Hydro
- 0 Mtoe
- 2026-05 · United Kingdom
- Nuclear
- 0.6 Mtoe
- 2026-05 · United Kingdom
- Oil
- 0 Mtoe
- 2026-05 · United Kingdom
- Solar
- 0.1 Mtoe
- 2026-05 · United Kingdom
- Wind
- 0.4 Mtoe
- 2026-05 · United Kingdom
Supply and sales in the latest Energy Trends month
These monthly TWh columns retain their published geography. England and Wales and Scotland sales are not relabelled as United Kingdom.
- Domestic sales
- 6.8 TWh
- 2026-05 · United Kingdom
- Industrial sales
- 4.9 TWh
- 2026-05 · United Kingdom
- Sales in england and wales
- 17.4 TWh
- 2026-05 · England and Wales
- Sales in scotland
- 1.5 TWh
- 2026-05 · Scotland
- Total electricity available
- 23.8 TWh
- 2026-05 · United Kingdom
- Total electricity consumption
- 21.3 TWh
- 2026-05 · United Kingdom
- Total sales to consumers
- 19.4 TWh
- 2026-05 · United Kingdom
Generation by fuel in the latest Energy Trends quarter
All-generating-company TWh figures. The quarterly category layout is kept separate from the monthly column series. Monthly tables publish one metric per column while quarterly tables publish many categories beneath one metric. They are returned separately and not flattened.
- Bioenergy
- 10.1 TWh
- 2026-Q1 · United Kingdom
- Coal
- 0 TWh
- 2026-Q1 · United Kingdom
- Gas
- 26.6 TWh
- 2026-Q1 · United Kingdom
- Nuclear
- 8.8 TWh
- 2026-Q1 · United Kingdom
- Solar
- 2.7 TWh
- 2026-Q1 · United Kingdom
- Total wind
- 29.3 TWh
- 2026-Q1 · United Kingdom
Supply and consumption in the latest Energy Trends quarter
Quarterly supply, demand, consumption, losses, imports and exports are published as categories beneath one GWh metric. They are not merged with the monthly TWh columns.
- Domestic excluding electric vehicles
- 27,421 GWh
- 2026-Q1 · United Kingdom
- Exports
- 4,219 GWh
- 2026-Q1 · United Kingdom
- Imports
- 10,402 GWh
- 2026-Q1 · United Kingdom
- Losses
- 8,449 GWh
- 2026-Q1 · United Kingdom
- Other industries
- 18,904 GWh
- 2026-Q1 · United Kingdom
- Total demand
- 88,704 GWh
- 2026-Q1 · United Kingdom
- Total supply
- 88,469 GWh
- 2026-Q1 · United Kingdom
Renewable capacity and generation
Capacity and generation have different technology rows and are never joined or summed by category. Shares use the unit stored with each row.
- Total
- 66,030 MW
- 2026-Q1 · United Kingdom
- Total
- 43,659.7 GWh
- 2026-Q1 · United Kingdom
All renewables supplied 53.1% of United Kingdom generation in 2026-Q1.
Scope, editions and sources
Every array is drawn from one newest unambiguous release per source. Mixed publication-date coverage or a tied newest release makes that source unavailable. DUKES publishes two differently scoped rows for 1987. This read keeps its all generating companies row and excludes the narrower major-power-producer row. The existing Energy Trends 5.4 coal history remains owned by its separate transition reader and is not duplicated here.
- Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0 · Digest of UK Energy Statistics chapter 5: electricity · Open Government Licence v3.0
- Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0 · Energy Trends section 5: electricity · Open Government Licence v3.0
- Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0 · Energy Trends 6.1: renewable electricity capacity and generation, quarterly · Open Government Licence v3.0
Trace every figure
Sources and licences
Energy Review reconciles these official datasets but does not alter missing values or blend actuals with forecasts. A source marked “used” contributed to the interval above.
- Used
Elexon Limited
Initial National and Transmission System Demand Outturn
Contains BMRS data © Elexon Limited copyright and database right 2026.
Last checked
- Used
Elexon Limited
Generation outturn summary by fuel type
Contains BMRS data © Elexon Limited copyright and database right 2026.
Last checked
- Used
Elexon Limited
Market Index Data (MID)
Contains BMRS data © Elexon Limited copyright and database right 2026.
Last checked
- Used
Elexon Limited
Indicative System Buy and Sell Prices (DISEBSP)
Contains BMRS data © Elexon Limited copyright and database right 2026.
Last checked
- Used
National Energy System Operator
Carbon Intensity API — national intensity
Contains Carbon Intensity API data from National Energy System Operator, licensed under CC BY 4.0.
Last checked
- Used
National Energy System Operator
Demand Data Update
Supported by National Energy SO Open Data
Last checked
How to read these figures
MW is power. It describes the rate of demand or generation during an interval.
MWh is energy. One half-hour at a steady 1 MW is 0.5 MWh.
Imports are not a fuel. They balance supply and demand but are excluded from generation shares because their source mix is not known here.
Read the full Energy Review methodology.