This article appears as part of the Winds of Change newsletter.

In recent days it has been widely trumpeted that renewable energy produced a record amount of electricity in Great Britain in 2025. Where, though, is the mention of where it is coming from? It seems to me time to blow our own trumpet.

According to BBC analysis of provisional figures from the National Energy System Operator (NESO), wind was the biggest single source of electricity. It generated nearly 30% of Great Britain's electricity last year, up slightly on 2024, but there was also a significant rise in solar, which generated 6%, and gas was still responsible for 27%.

Much of that wind energy is from Scotland, which continues, as ever, a strong part in tackling climate change and bringing down UK greenhouse gas emissions. Over two thirds of the UK’s onshore wind capacity is in Scotland, and just under a fifth of current offshore wind capacity.

But before I move on to bigging-up our hard work, a quick, more-sobering note. All of this sounds like fantastic news, except that behind these figures is the fact that efforts to decarbonise the grid, effectively stalled last year.

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Analysis by Carbon Brief, for instance, showed that though the fleet of wind, solar and biomass power plants all set new records in 2025, but electricity from gas still went up.

There are a number of reasons for this. UK coal generation ended in late 2025 and nuclear power hit its lowest level in half a century.

“In addition,” the Carbon Brief article says, “there was a 1% rise in UK electricity demand – after........

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