Harold Wilson Annual Lecture - The challenges of running a low-carbon electricity grid
This lecture, the second of the Harold Wilson Lecture Series, outlined the importance of a low carbon grid in Britain and the challenges this presents.
In 2016, as part of the University's 50th Anniversary, in honour of our first Chancellor, the Prime Minister, Lord Harold Wilson of Rievaulx, and of his great foresight in setting up a technology university such as Bradford, we initiated the prestigious Harold Wilson Lecture Series.
Dorothy Thompson was the 2017 guest speaker. Dorothy was appointed CEO of Drax Group plc in September 2005, she is also a Non-Executive Director of Eaton Corporation plc and the Court of the Bank of England.
Dorothy explained how there is a consensus that the future of the UK power system lies in low-carbon, renewable, power and how this needs to be delivered quickly.
"Sustainability has three pillars, economic, environmental and societal. Climate change is a threat to the environmental pillar but ultimately we knew it would undermine the economic and societal pillars too so like any sustainable business we did not wait until the threat undermined all three. That is why our decarbonisation strategy, which is bearing fruit now, actually has its roots in a leadership position we took in the previous decade."