To ask Her Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the current state of United Kingdom electricity storage; and what effect the recent spell of bad weather had on such storage. [HL1526]

The UK has no electricity storage facilities. The UK does have hydro-electricity generators that utilise pumped storage (whereby water is pumped to an upper reservoir at periods of low demand to be released to generate electricity at periods of high demand). Pumped storage generation therefore offers a critical short-term back-up facility during periods of intense demand on the national grid system.

We are not aware that the recent spell of bad weather has had any appreciable effect on pumped storage.