Policy paper

The UK’s clean electrification roadmap

Published 12 November 2026

Seizing the opportunity of clean power: Unlocking the benefits of electrification for UK consumers, businesses, and energy security

Clean electrification is a major global opportunity: to strengthen energy security, competitiveness and affordability; create green growth and jobs; and reduce emissions. This roadmap highlights some of the steps the UK is taking to seize that opportunity and the pathway the UK is taking towards clean powered homes, buildings, travel and industry.

Clean electrification means shifting energy demand from fossil fuels to clean electricity. In September 2024, the UK became the first G7 country to phase out coal-fired power, ending more than 140 years of coal-based electricity generation. Since July 2024, the UK has made a renewed push towards clean power generation securing more than £100 billion of private clean energy investment^{[footnote 1]}. The next challenge is to put that clean power to work across buildings, transport and industry, facilitated by an efficient grid infrastructure and smart systems. Clean power is the backbone of the transition to net zero; its full value is realised when it replaces fossil fuels across the economy.

Clean electrification can deliver benefits for consumers, investors and national energy security. Electric technologies are more efficient than their fossil fuel counterparts requiring less energy input to deliver the same useful output and helping to bring down energy costs as clean electricity becomes more affordable. Replacing imported fossil fuels with homegrown clean power strengthens energy security and reduces exposure to international fossil fuel price shocks. Alongside expanding renewables and other low carbon sectors, the government has introduced legislation to deliver its commitment to end new oil and gas licences to explore new fields, giving certainty and supporting an orderly transition away from fossil fuels.

The UK’s actions on electrification form part of a growing ambition internationally. The COP31 Presidency has called on the world to accelerate electrification to 35% of total final energy consumption by 2035. We see clean electrification as critical to delivering the Global Stocktake commitments on renewables, energy efficiency and transitioning away from fossil fuels. Realising the benefits requires a drive towards clean electrification of end use to progress alongside coordinated clean power growth.

This roadmap shows how the UK is accelerating progress towards those goals through actions that are legislated for, funded or in delivery. It brings together three connected priorities to explain how they support clean electrification in homes and buildings; modernising the electricity system; helping all households and businesses switch to fair, affordable and clean electricity, bringing costs down to improve the economic proposition and ensure no one is left behind by supporting the most vulnerable; and building the skills and supply chains needed for delivery. International partnerships connect these priorities with efforts to accelerate clean electrification worldwide for the benefit of all.

Countries start from different positions, but many of the building blocks are shared. By setting out the UK’s experience and the road we are on, we aim to support others pursuing their own pathways to clean electrification.

Modernising the electricity system 

Generation, transmission and networks 

Delivery starts with the electricity system itself. The UK has moved quickly to build the generation and network infrastructure that electrification depends on. A record 52.1% of UK electricity generation in 2025 came from renewable technologies^{[footnote 2]}. The UK’s latest competitive auction for new renewable electricity projects secured a record 201 projects totalling 14.7 GW, enough to supply the equivalent of 16 million homes. New onshore wind was agreed at £72.24 per MWh and solar at £65.23 per MWh, both under half the £147 per MWh cost of building and operating new gas power stations^{[footnote 3]}.

With electricity demand set to more than double by 2050^{[footnote 4]}, networks are being readied for growth. The government is working with energy system bodies to reform the connections process so that projects that are ready and needed can connect to the grid first^{[footnote 5]}. We are also acting to speed up network build, through reforms to planning and consenting, support for supply chains and skills, and reform of land access rights, to support delivery of the 80 critical transmission projects identified for clean power delivery^{[footnote 6]}. We are partnering with UK industry on this endeavour. National Grid, one of Great Britain’s major electricity transmission network operators has confirmed £1.2 billion of contracts to upgrade 1,000km of transmission lines^{[footnote 7]}.

National Grid has also been installing Dynamic Line Ratings (DLR) technology through key transmission network routes. By combining real-time monitoring with advanced weather and climate data, transmission lines are able to carry electricity more safely and increase circuit capability. With DLR being applied across 900 km of National Grid’s transmission network, the latest rollout is expected to deliver up to £50 million in consumer savings over five years in constraint costs.

SSE’s distribution network business, SSEN Distribution, has pioneered an industry-leading, place-based approach to electricity network planning through its Local Energy Net Zero Accelerator (LENZA) tool and co-creation of Strategic Development Plans (SDPs). LENZA is a free geospatial planning platform, giving local authorities and communities access to the distribution network data that supports their electrification ambitions. SSEN Distribution has published 37 SDPs, co-created with local authorities, providing long-term blueprints for electricity system needs out to 2050. LENZA and SDPs work to connect local ambitions with network planning, helping unlock investment, accelerate connections to the electricity grid, and ensure infrastructure meets future local needs.

Markets and bills 

A more flexible electricity system helps lower costs for consumers and businesses, a central factor to increasing electricity demand.  Smart tariffs, smart charging and home batteries shift use to when electricity is cheapest and most plentiful, reducing demand peaks and the need for network reinforcement and new capacity. 

We are introducing world-leading legislation and technical standards to support growing markets in consumer-led flexibility that will help consumers make bill savings. This helps keep system costs and bills down. The government’s ambition is a two to three-fold increase in clean flexibility capacity, to between 51 and 66 GW by 2030. The Clean Flexibility Roadmap sets out the actions to deliver this, including unlocking greater consumer-led flexibility, accelerating electricity storage and strengthening interconnection^{[footnote 8]}.

The UK has also taken action to reduce energy costs and improve the economics of electrification for businesses and consumers. From April 2026, an average of £150 was taken off household energy bills, with the substantial majority of these costs coming off electricity bills and onto general taxation^{[footnote 9]}. Alongside the removal of value-added tax (VAT) on electricity bills from October 2026^{[footnote 10]}, these measures aim to make clean electricity more affordable, let consumers benefit from using it flexibly, and make better use of existing networks so that system costs stay down, while keeping investment in clean power attractive.

Innovation from industry experts is also helping UK consumers take control of their bills, and a leading example of that is Kraken. Energy companies face costly, complex regulatory changes that can disrupt customer service and delay new products. Kraken’s configurable platform helps clients adapt by translating regulatory requirements into platform changes, helping open new markets for consumer flexibility at scale and included at no extra charge to customers. Kraken clients will be the first UK retailers able to launch broader dynamic tariffs, new flexibility products and other innovation unlocked by half-hourly settlements.

Helping households and businesses electrify 

Homes and buildings demand 

Clean technologies must be affordable, accessible and attractive to consumers. For households, the Warm Homes Plan outlines the UK’s ambition to deliver 450,000 heat pump installations per year by 2030 and to triple the number of homes with solar today by deploying panels on the rooftops of up to 3 million more homes. Last month, the government launched the Warm Homes Loan Scheme, a scheme that provides households with no- and low-interest loans to support home electrification and increased heat pump uptake. This builds on growing demand through the Boiler Upgrade Scheme, which provides upfront grants towards heat pump installations and received a record number of applications in the past year.

From 2027, the Future Homes and Buildings Standards, a new building standard that will ensure new buildings are designed for a clean energy future, with low-carbon heating, high levels of energy efficiency and on-site renewable electricity generation. For existing homes, we are also raising Minimum Energy Efficiency Standards for rented homes, driving investment in energy efficiency and low-carbon technologies. In August 2026, plug-in solar panels became available to households in Great Britain, providing up to 20% of an average home’s electricity and saving up to £110 a year^{[footnote 11]}.

In commercial and non-residential buildings, we are taking a targeted approach to raising Minimum Energy Efficiency Standards to EPC B for larger privately rented buildings, focusing action where it can deliver the greatest benefits. This is expected to help tenants save up to £360 million a year on energy bills by 2031^{[footnote 12]}, while reducing their exposure to future energy price shocks.

Industry partners are also taking action to encourage electrification across homes.

Launched in 2022, Octopus Energy’s Zero Bills scheme works with housebuilders to equip homes with heat pumps, batteries and solar panels and guarantees no home energy bills for five to ten years. Octopus has approved more than 6,000 homes as eligible and aims to deliver 100,000 Zero Bills homes by 2030, with regional housebuilders Thakeham, Verto and gs8 committing all their future homes to the scheme. Alongside new homes, Octopus has begun retrofit trials for existing homes. The initiative is also expanding internationally, reaching customers in newly built and retrofitted homes across France, Germany and New Zealand.

Octopus has also launched Tenant Power in 2025, which helps social housing tenants and landlords share the financial rewards of low carbon electric technologies. Buildings are equipped with solar panels battery systems to generate renewable energy, which can be stored and automatically sold back to the grid at peak times. Landlords can generate revenue and tenants benefit from electricity savings of around £200 a year compared with standard variable tariffs. Tenant Power works with 12 partners, and has over 100,000 properties under management, with 2,000 installations already committed and is paving the way to cleaner, fairer and cheaper energy in social housing.

Transport 

Transport is one of the most important places to put clean electricity to work, because it is where households and businesses are most directly exposed to oil prices. Electric vehicles are cheaper to run, with drivers able to save up to £1,750 a year on running costs^{[footnote 13]}, and every vehicle that switches reduces the amount of imported fuel the country needs. The market is already moving: more than one in four new cars sold are now electric, and over two million electric vehicles are registered on UK roads^{[footnote 14]}.

The government’s aim is to accelerate the switch from fossil fuels to electricity across transport, while taking industry on the journey. The Zero Emission Vehicle (ZEV) mandate is driving the uptake of EVs and will phase out new cars running solely on petrol or diesel from 2030, and phase out new non-zero emission cars and vans from 2035^{[footnote 15]}. The Electric Car Grant, which has £2 billion funding committed until March 2030, takes up to £3,750 off the price of eligible new electric cars costing £37,000 or less^{[footnote 16]}.

This transition also presents a significant opportunity for investment and jobs in electric vehicles, charging, and clean technologies. The government is backing the EV market with £7.5 billion of support^{[footnote 17]}, with £170 million for fleets through the Depot Charging Scheme, which supports charging infrastructure at commercial vehicle depots^{[footnote 18]}, and £400m to local authorities in England to install low powered, on-street charging to support those without access to private off-street parking^{[footnote 19]}.

And once again, innovation from industry is playing its part. Intelligent Octopus GO is an EV tariff that uses machine learning technology. It communicates directly with cars and chargers and automatically powers vehicles when renewable energy is abundant and cheap. Charging an EV at home costs around £8 compared with filling a diesel car for £100. Drivers unlock ultra-cheap charging rates and overnight savings for their entire households.

Industry 

Industry is an important area where electrification has the potential to deliver significant economic returns. Electrifying industrial processes gives manufacturers a route to lower emissions and more stable costs, and it turns a growing supply of clean power into productive demand. As electricity plays an increasingly important role across the economy, expected to meet most of final energy demand by 2050, the opportunity for firms supporting electrification is substantial^{[footnote 20]}.

We will reindustrialise Britain by rebuilding domestic manufacturing and cutting industrial energy costs, so that firms can spend less on energy and more on investing, growing and creating good jobs. Since 2024, the British Industry Supercharger, a package of government support to reduce electricity costs for energy intensive industries, has provided energy intensive industries with exemptions from a range of electricity policy and capacity costs^{[footnote 21]}. In April 2026, support with network charges increased from 60% to 90%, bringing the whole package to £78/MWh off electricity bills for recipients and saving around 500 businesses in sectors such as steel, chemicals, cement, glass and paper up to £420 million a year^{[footnote 22]}. The British Industrial Competitiveness Scheme extends this support to more than 10,000 manufacturers across Great Britain. From April 2027 it will cut electricity costs for eligible firms by up to £40/MWh, or up to 25%^{[footnote 23]}. We are also continuing to develop policies to bring down electricity costs relative to gas for the non-domestic sector.

Enabling and managing the transition 

Skills and supply chain 

Delivering electrification gives us an opportunity to create skilled jobs and clean energy supply chains across the country. The Clean Energy Jobs Plan sets out the workforce needed to deliver the UK’s clean energy mission, which is estimated to grow jobs in the sector by hundreds of thousands by the end of the decade^{[footnote 24]}. Our Clean Energy Jobs Plan helps to make the clean energy sector the best place to work in the UK, offering good wages, stability, and the opportunity to progress in a varied and interesting career. We are supporting this by increasing trade union representation and collective bargaining and by using government grants and procurement to promote workforce criteria. We are also launching five Clean Energy Technical Excellence Colleges, which will give young people the lifelong skills they need to step into Britain’s fast-expanding clean energy sector.

The Clean Energy Industries Sector Plan targets at least a doubling of investment in frontier clean energy industries to over £30 billion a year by 2035, with a further £700 million for Great British Energy, the UK’s publicly owned energy company, to invest in clean energy supply chains^{[footnote 25]}. The Clean Industry Bonus, government support designed to encourage renewable energy developers to invest in UK supply chains, is helping to mobilise private investment: £204 million of public investment, awarded alongside the UK’s latest competitive auction for new renewable electricity projects, has leveraged £3.4 billion of private investment in British factories, ports and supply chains^{[footnote 26]}.

International 

Partnering internationally 

Electrification is an opportunity for every country. Pairing electrification of transport, buildings and industry with expanding clean power and storage can strengthen energy security, competitiveness and affordability, create growth and jobs, and cut emissions. Electrification and keeping up momentum on moving away from fossil fuels go hand in hand: electrifying our economies with clean power is how countries will reduce their reliance on fossil fuels in practice. 

We can all benefit from sharing experiences and building partnerships to address shared challenges. We will draw on our own experience of the clean energy transition. The UK will work internationally to help ensure all countries can capture these benefits, particularly emerging markets and developing economies (EMDEs). We are backing this with practical support. Through the Global Clean Power Alliance Finance Mission, the UK is partnering with EMDEs to develop the people, plans and projects needed to unlock clean energy investment. Through our international climate finance programmes, we are mobilising expertise and derisking finance to remove barriers to private capital investment in clean electrification.

Through Electrify Now, we will work with high-ambition countries, finance institutions and delivery partners to accelerate implementation, ambition and momentum towards the second Global Stocktake at COP33.

As co-chair of Transitioning Away from Fossil Fuels Santa Marta workstream 1, we will coordinate support with partners for countries accelerating transition planning and implementing nationally led pathways. 

Accelerating clean electrification globally will benefit the UK. Growing markets create opportunities for UK strengths in financial and professional services, engineering, grids and flexibility, digital technologies and clean energy innovation. Faster global deployment can bring down technology costs, accelerate innovation and learning, and reduce dependence on internationally traded fossil fuels, supporting a more secure and affordable UK transition.

1. Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ) (2026), Government has secured £100 billion of clean energy investment, GOV.UK, 24 June 2026. ↩

2. DESNZ, Digest of UK Energy Statistics (DUKES) 2026, annual data for 2025 (30 July 2026). ↩

3. DESNZ press release, New auction delivers unprecedented clean, homegrown power (10 February 2026). ↩

4. DESNZ, Accelerating electricity network connections for strategic demand: consultation outcome (updated 28 October 2026). ↩

5. DESNZ, Accelerating electricity network connections for strategic demand: government response (2026). ↩

6. Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (2026), Accelerating electricity network connections for strategic demand, GOV.UK ↩

7. DESNZ press release, Government has secured £100 billion of clean energy investment (24 June 2026). The figure counts investment announced since July 2024, whether or not projects have reached a final investment decision. ↩

8. Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (2025), Clean Flexibility Roadmap, GOV.UK, 23 July 2025, updated 13 July 2026 ↩

9. Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (2025), What does the Autumn Budget mean for your energy bills?, GOV.UK, 27 November 2025. ↩

10. Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (2026), Breathing space on your energy bill, GOV.UK, 26 August 2026. ↩

11. Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (2026), Households can save as plug-in solar panels come to market, GOV.UK, 26 August 2026. ↩

12. Minimum Energy Efficiency Standards (MEES) in the non-domestic Private Rented Sector: interim response, DESNZ, updated 18 June 2026. ↩

13. HM Treasury (2026), Cutting electric vehicle charging costs, GOV.UK, 28 October 2026. ↩

14. Department for Transport (2026), Review launched to shape pathway to reach zero emission driving by 2035, GOV.UK, 14 August 2026. ↩

15. Department for Transport and Office for Zero Emission Vehicles (2024), Pathway for zero emission vehicle transition by 2035 becomes law, GOV.UK, 3 January 2024. ↩

16. Department for Transport (2025), Electric Car Grant, GOV.UK Find a Grant ↩

17. HM Treasury (2026), Cutting electric vehicle charging costs, GOV.UK, 28 October 2026. ↩

18. Department for Transport (2026), Depot Charging Scheme, GOV.UK Find a Grant. ↩

19. Office for Zero Emission Vehicles (2025), Electric vehicle charging infrastructure on the strategic road network, GOV.UK, 11 July 2025 ↩

20. Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (2025), Unlocking the benefits of the clean energy economy, GOV.UK, October 2025 ↩

21. Department for Business and Trade (2025), Proposed uplift to the Network Charging Compensation Scheme for energy intensive industries (EIIs): government consultation response, GOV.UK, updated 31 October 2025 ↩

22. Department for Business and Trade (2026), The Network Charging Compensation Scheme (part of the British Industry Supercharger package of measures), GOV.UK, 27 March 2026 ↩

23. DESNZ, Clean Energy Jobs Plan (19 October 2025). ↩

24. DESNZ press release, Clean energy future to be ‘built in Britain’ (23 June 2025). ↩

25. DESNZ press release, Record renewables auction supports 7,000 jobs and £3bn investment (15 January 2026). ↩

26. Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade (2026), Applications open for scheme to slash electricity bills for over 10,000 manufacturers, GOV.UK, 1 October 2026 ↩