Europe is embarked on a once off transition to sustainability. Member States of the EU have committed to reduce their Kyoto Greenhouse Gas emissions by at least 20% below 1990 levels by 2020. The UK has undertaken to reduce its GHG emissions by 80% by 2050.
In addition, the EU has agreed that by 2020 20% of all energy produced by Member States has to come from renewable sources. This will require at least 30% of the EU's electricity to come from renewable sources by that date. By 2050 all of Europe's electricity could come from zero carbon sources.
Further, the EU has embarked on a process to open up the European electricity market to competition, to facilitate cross-border trade and to reduce the market dominance of existing national suppliers. This competition will drive down prices, increase innovation and underpin the growth of a low carbon economy across Europe.
The primary fuel sources for this transition to renewable generation will be wind, solar and marine energy. These assets are by their nature continental and not national resources. To fully harness and deliver over 1500GW of firm renewable power into load centres across the EU will require large-scale interconnection joining the centres of production.
The IEA has estimated that on current plans around €200bn will have to be invested to upgrade existing transmission assets in Europe through to 2030. The opportunity presented by the transition to sustainability is to create an integrated cross-border grid network that will replace the need to upgrade these national assets, while delivering significant savings on the operational cost of power generation by creating a flexible HVDC network that bypasses existing grid bottlenecks.
This integrated network is Supergrid.
In late 2009, Norway joined nine member states of the EU, including the UK and Germany, to develop policy to advance offshore interconnection in Europe. This is tangible evidence of government support for cross-border connectivity as part of Europe's move to open its electricity markets to trade in renewable energy.
Supergrid has received support from within the European Institutions, within EU member state governments, and from across the energy sector. The concept of large-scale DC interconnection to deliver equally large-scale renewable electricity generation has become an accepted part of the policy debate around Europe's long-term energy future.
It will require a new framework for the ownership and operation of the European grid network. It will draw together entrepreneurs and established transmission operators, as well as design, engineering and construction consultants and builders, to create the templates for interconnection and electricity trading.
Its time has come because there is a political imperative to source clean energy, to ensure security of supply and to restore our global competitiveness.
Its time has come because we now have the technologies to hand which can meet each of these three objectives.
Its time has come because it is the only available guarantee that our children will enjoy low cost, low carbon and low risk energy supplies.