Community benefits from net zero energy developments: consultation

5. Glossary

Developer: A person or entity engaged in the design, construction and/or operation of newly developed renewable or low-carbon energy resources.

Community energy is the delivery of community-led energy projects, whether wholly owned and/or controlled by communities, or through partnerships with commercial or public sector partners.

Local energy is wide ranging, involving a range of different organisations (public, private, and community sector), who are delivering an energy service/project for the benefit of local people operating within a defined geographical area.

Community Wealth Building (CWB) is a people-centred approach to local economic development, which redirects wealth back into the local economy, and places control and benefits into the hands of local people.

Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS): are rechargeable batteries that can store energy from different sources and discharge it when needed. BESS consists of one or more batteries and can be used to balance the electrical grid, provide backup power, and improve grid stability.

Bioenergy Carbon Capture and Storage (BECCS): BECCS is a Negative Emissions Technology (NETs) and, if proven at scale, would help achieve Scotland's net zero targets, compensating for residual emissions in hard-to-decarbonise sectors.

Carbon Capture, Utilisation and Storage (CCUS): CCUS encompasses the methods and technologies used to capture the carbon dioxide generated by large-scale energy intensive processes, such as power generation and industrial processes, and the transportation of the captured carbon dioxide for safe and permanent storage deep underground in a geological formation.

Constraints: When the electricity transmission system is unable to transmit power to match the location of demand, due to congestion at one or more parts of the transmission network, constraint management is needed.

Contract for Difference: Contractual agreement offered to a low carbon electricity generator by the UK Government owned Low Carbon Contracts Company (LCCC) through auction, which guarantees a set price for the electricity generated known as the strike price. Movements in the wholesale price of electricity see generators either paid a subsidy to match the higher price, or pay back surplus when the market falls below the strike price.

Electricity storage: Electricity can be stored in many ways. Several technologies are already utilised in our electricity system which balance out the intermittent nature of renewables, including grid scale battery storage, as well as pumped hydro storage.

Energy Generation: The production of electricity, heat, or usable fuel through the conversion of renewable sources, extraction and processing of fossil fuels or conversion of other primary sources of energy.

Energy Networks: A system of connected cables or pipes for transporting electricity or gas from the points of generation to the points of demand.

Grid-scale storage: Technologies connected to the power grid that can store energy and then supply it back to the grid at a more advantageous time – for example, at night, when no solar power is available, or during a weather event that disrupts electricity generation.

Heat Networks: Heat networks distribute heat or cooling from a central source or sources and deliver it to a variety of different customers such as public buildings, shops, offices, hospitals, universities and homes. By supplying multiple buildings, they avoid the need for individual boilers or electric heaters in every building.

Local Heat and Energy Efficiency Strategies (LHEES): These local strategies will underpin an area-based approach to heat and energy efficiency planning and delivery.

Long Duration Energy Storage (LDES): Technology which has the capacity to convert electricity to another form of energy and convert it back to electricity, supplying the grid with continuous power over several hours or longer. LDES Technologies include pumped hydro storage, liquid air energy storage, compressed air energy storage and hydrogen.

Low carbon / blue hydrogen: Hydrogen produced by reforming natural gas or biogas in conjunction with carbon capture and storage with high capture rates.

Negative Emissions Technologies (NETs): NETs are an emerging field of technologies that remove greenhouse gases from the atmosphere and, utilising carbon capture and storage, sequester them permanently. NETs can include forms of Direct Air Capture with Carbon Storage (DACCS), Bioenergy with Carbon Capture and Storage (BECCS) or other more experimental means such as enhanced weathering or biochar.

Net zero: Scotland has set a target to become ‘net zero’ by 2045. This means the amount of greenhouse gas emissions we put into the atmosphere and the

amount we take out will balance, resulting in zero new emissions.

Pipeline: Electricity generation capacity, which is under construction, awaiting construction, or in planning.

Potential pipeline: Electricity generation capacity that is not yet in the official planning pipeline (in the Renewable Energy Planning Database), but where information is available, for example from renewable energy developers.

Pumped hydro storage (PHS): This is a well-established technology with a long lifespan and is a critical contributor to enabling security of supply and providing flexibility.

Renewable energy: Energy derived from replenishable sources such as solar or wind power, or sustainably sourced biomass.

Renewable / green hydrogen: Hydrogen produced using electrolysis of water, powered by renewable electricity. This is zero carbon.

Scottish Offshore Wind Energy Council (SOWEC): SOWEC is a partnership between the Scottish public sector and the offshore wind industry.

Short duration electricity storage: This describes technologies that can deploy electricity for one to four hours.

Solar PV: Solar PV (photovoltaics) are solar panels which capture the sun’s energy and convert it into electricity.

Solar thermal: Solar thermal energy uses the sun’s energy to heat primarily water.

Supply chain: A network between a company and its suppliers to produce and distribute a specific product to the final buyer. This network includes different activities, people, entities, information and resources. The supply chain also represents the steps it takes to get the product or service from its original state to the customer. ‘Supply chain benefits’ will refer to positive impacts arising from such a network.

Watts: Watts are a unit of power used to quantify the rate of energy transfer. A Kilowatt (KW) is equal to one thousand Watts. A Megawatt (MW) is equal to one million Watts. A Gigawatt (GW) is equal to one billion Watts. A Terawatt is equal to one trillion watts.

Watt hours: A Watt-hour is a unit of work or energy equivalent to the power of one watt operating for one hour. A kilowatt-hour is equal to one thousand watt-hours. A Megawatt-hour is equal to one million watt-hours. A Gigawatt-hour is equal to one billion watt-hours. A Terawatt-hour is equal to one trillion watt-hours.