But developments in battery technology are changing all of this, opening the way for the industry to carry inventories for the first time and creating incentives to reduce the amount of both generation and grid capacity that is required. In the long term this can only mean lower electricity prices.

And this trend in prices is reinforced by the fact that costs of new technology like solar and wind have fallen below the cost of fossil technology and that grid capacity can be improved using practices like dynamic line rating which involve little increase in capital expenditure.