Plain-English explainer · companion to Wasted Wind
Cheap power, high bills
How Britain can be awash with cheap wind and still hand you an expensive electricity bill — and where the money actually goes.
Two kinds of power feed the grid
Wind & solar
Cheap to run — the fuel (wind, sun) is free.
Low costGas power stations
Expensive — and the price swings with world gas markets.
High costGas sets the price — for everyone
Every half-hour the grid pays a single price — the cost of the most expensive plant it needs, which is almost always gas. So the cheap generators get paid the gas price too. Gas set the price about two-thirds of the time in early 2026.
The gap between what the cheap generators cost and the gas price they get paid is pure bonus — economists call it “inframarginal rent.” In plain terms: windfall profit.
Three ways the money leaks
Windfall to generators
45%The gas-linked windfall is real enough that the Government taxes it — the Electricity Generator Levy (since 2023), proposed to rise to 55%.
Wasted wind
£343mPaid in 2025 to switch Scottish wind farms off when the grid can’t move the power — and recovered from us on bills.
The “green premium”
£1–2What a “green tariff” really bought: a REGO certificate that re-labels ordinary power — Ofgem says “not sufficient evidence” of real benefit.
The bill lands on you
High bills — despite the cheap power being right there
The clean, cheap electricity genuinely exists. The market design is what stops it reaching your bill.
The whole thing in one line
We price electricity off gas, so cheap wind never cuts the bill; the cheap generators pocket the gas-linked windfall; we pay to waste wind we can’t move; and the “green premium” mostly bought a certificate, not clean power. It’s all legal — so the job is to change the rules.
The fixes worth pushing for
Unhook price from gas
“Decouple” the market so cheap renewables actually lower what we pay.
Honest “green” labels
“Green” should mean new clean power — not a £1 certificate on the same grid mix.
Use the wasted wind
Storage, hydrogen and grid upgrades — so we use clean power instead of binning it.
Sources (public reporting, Sept 2026): gas / marginal pricing — Carbon Brief, Ofgem; REGO green-tariff labelling — Ofgem REGO review (“not sufficient evidence”), CMA Green Claims Code; inframarginal windfall & Electricity Generator Levy (45%, from 2023; proposed 55%) — HM Treasury / BDO; Scottish wind curtailment (~£343m, 2025) — public curtailment-cost reporting. Figures indicative. An awareness & advocacy explainer — not legal or financial advice.