What happens to electricity when its production is greater than consumption?

Question

On very windy and sunny days the energy production of renewables skyrockets, but what happens to all that electricity that doesn’t get consumed? Is it all dispersed in the ground/heat or am I missing something?

In: 5

Answer 1

In the UK where about 25% of energy comes from wind, under exceptionally windy conditions at particularly low demand parts of the day (e.g middle of the night), if required, wind farms actually get paid to shut down. This is expensive, so we occasionally get wierd things like negative energy prices – you can get paid to use electricity!