Quick answer
Energy Mix uses electricity-system language carefully: most live figures refer to Great Britain, not the whole UK electricity market, and source categories can vary between datasets. This glossary links the key terms back to the relevant live pages.
Terms
- Carbon intensity
- An estimate of the carbon dioxide emissions associated with each unit of electricity consumed, usually shown in grams of CO₂ per kilowatt-hour.
- Carbon intensity guide
- Electricity mix
- The blend of sources generating electricity at a point in time, such as wind, solar, gas, nuclear, biomass, hydro, storage and imports.
- UK electricity mix
- FUELINST
- Elexon’s near-real-time fuel type data for Great Britain’s transmission-connected electricity generation.
- Data sources
- Interconnector
- A high-voltage electricity link between Britain and another market. It can import power into Britain or export British power abroad.
- Interconnectors explained
- Low-carbon electricity
- Electricity from sources with low operational emissions, commonly including wind, solar, nuclear, hydro and some imports depending on source mix.
- RenewablesNuclear power
- Settlement period
- A 30-minute electricity-market accounting window. Some official figures arrive or settle on this cadence rather than second-by-second.
- Methodology
- System demand
- A measure of how much electricity the grid needs at a given time. Definitions differ between datasets, especially around embedded generation and storage.
- Electricity demand
- Wind generation
- Electricity generated from onshore and offshore wind. It is often the biggest swing factor in Britain’s live electricity mix.
- Renewables
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