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New Energy World
New Energy World embraces the whole energy industry as it connects and converges to address the decarbonisation challenge. It covers progress being made across the industry, from the dynamics under way to reduce emissions in oil and gas, through improvements to the efficiency of energy conversion and use, to cutting-edge initiatives in renewable and low carbon technologies.
A potential 3,800 km-long clean energy solution for the UK
19/10/2022
6 min read
The intermittency of renewable energy sources is one of their biggest challenges. But long-distance renewable projects connecting areas with reliably high levels of sun and wind to energy markets could become an important solution to this, writes Abby Hockman, Marketing Communications Manager for Xlinks.
The proposed Xlinks Morocco-UK Power Project would be a new electricity generation facility entirely powered by solar and wind energy combined with a battery storage facility. Located in Morocco’s renewable energy rich region of Guelmim Oued Noun, it would be connected exclusively to the UK via 3,800 km HVDC subsea cables.
A ‘first of a kind’, the Xlinks project is expected to generate 10.5 GW of zero carbon electricity from the sun and wind to deliver 3.6 GW of reliable energy for an average of 20+ hours a day. This would be enough to provide low-cost, clean power to over 7mn British homes by 2030. Once complete, the project would be capable of supplying 8% of the UK’s electricity needs.
The scale of the £18bn Xlinks project mirrors the global drive to reach net zero. Only through a collective approach, with many innovative and creative solutions explored, will there be any hope of achieving the global targets called for in the Paris Agreement. If it seems ambitious, it is. Nevertheless, one can only imagine the reaction when the first transatlantic telecommunications cable was introduced, but look at the network now, embedded into everyday life without most of us giving it a second thought.