How to we 'keep the lights on' in an independent Scotland?
How do we make sure Scotland's electricity supply is secure on independence?
There are three bits of the energy system – generating the power, distributing the power to households and businesses and selling power to customers. In the UK this is all privatised and it must be assumed that generation and retail of energy will still be privatised on independence. But it doesn't make any sense to keep the distribution of power privatised because this is an issue for national security and the UK is the only country in Europe that has privatised distribution. While there are all sorts of very good reasons for reforming the energy system after independence, that is for future governments. But securing distribution should be part of the transition planning.
So how do we make sure the electricity keeps flowing?
It's not just electricity through the National Grid, it's gas through the gas grid as well. Both are overseen and managed by what is called a Transmission System Operator (TSO). At the moment this is split up between a few different private companies across the UK but in Scotland it is the responsibility of Scottish Power Networks. It should be converted into a Scottish TSO, but the technical infrastructure and personnel are all in place so this is just a transition to a publicly-owned model. Other that than that, Scotland generates more than enough electricity to meet domestic needs and until policy changes will remain part of the UK energy market. With gas the same applies – purchasing gas and distributing it via the gas grid won't be any different after independence.