Response to Clean Flexibility Roadmap

On the 23 July 2025, the UK government published its Clean Flexibility Roadmap. The Catapult responds.

Ben Shafran, Head of Business Model & Policy Innovation, Energy Systems Catapult, commented:

“Today’s publication of the Clean Flexibility Roadmap is a welcome step towards delivering a decarbonised power system by 2030. Consumer flexibility will be essential not only to achieving this target, but also to enabling a more innovative, productive economy capable of raising living standards in the long term.

The Roadmap must be the starting gun for a step-change in the government’s ambition. We need to inject pace and scale into the growth of flexibility to match the levels of investment going into renewables and the electricity grid.

That means creating the conditions that make it easy and attractive for consumers to flex their electricity use. The priority here should be to reform energy retail regulation from first principles, to ensure it is fit for a decarbonised, digital system.

Consumer propositions will only be as good as the underlying price signals. It is encouraging to see distribution use of system (DUoS) charges given priority in the Roadmap. At a national level, five-minute settlement in the wholesale market must be placed at the heart of the upcoming Reformed National Market Delivery Plan.

Digitalisation is key to making all of this work. The initiatives set out in NESO’s Sector Digitalisation Plan, such as Automatic Asset Registration, must be delivered with urgency.

To ensure coherence and technical leadership across this agenda, the new DESNZ Electricity System Flexibility division should be complemented by a new function in government: a system architect for energy flexibility, alongside a system integration capability. Together, these would provide the technical vision and delivery oversight needed to realise the ambitions of the Roadmap.

Flexibility is not a nice-to-have, it is critical for the delivery of a clean, secure and affordable power system. Government must move from planning to delivery, with urgency and clarity. The Roadmap sets the direction. Now we need action.”