Upgrading the grid: how to overcome challenges and accelerate new clean energy development

As investment in sustainable power increases, transmission and distribution networks risk becoming a hindrance in the race to achieve net-zero targets. Grid organisations must urgently address capacity challenges to expand and upgrade our infrastructure for the crucial decade to come. 

Global demand for electricity is booming. Growing use at home, such as for electric vehicles and the heating and cooling of our houses, is combining with huge requirements in our professional lives – from digital ways of working to the fuelling of major industry and new power-hungry data centres supporting the development and use of AI. This alone is creating pressure on our ageing grids. When coupled with the decarbonisation agenda, the task becomes almost Herculean. 

According to the International Energy Agency, over 80mn km of grid needs to be added or refurbished by 2040 to meet the electricity demand required to stay within the Paris Agreement’s temperature targets. That's the equivalent of the existing network worldwide.  

This isn't just a grid capacity challenge either. New grids need to be more flexible and agile than their predecessors.

“The intermittent nature of renewable sources means networks must be capable of balancing and storing energy to ensure a consistent and efficient power supply.”

The major programmes required to deliver this changing energy mix and escalating electricity demand are incredibly complex, spanning huge distances and competing for resource from constrained supply chains. Building the capability to handle these major programmes is critical to achieving load and non-load related upgrades to the electricity network infrastructure.

While global markets face differing regulatory landscapes and environmental and funding challenges to delivery, there are some commonalities. This is particularly true when it comes to industry capacity, with significant bottlenecks – from specialist parts to technical skills – stalling development of these more expansive, complex grids. 

In this context, there are three priorities operators and developers, regardless of geography, must consider as they are building, renovating and maintaining grids for the future.

Embedding robust government frameworks 

The first priority with any large-scale programme is determining how the programme management office (PMO) will manage its operations.

Empowering teams to succeed hinges on the establishment of a robust and transparent governance structure. Without one, managing significant investments becomes manual, slow and prone to errors. It’s therefore crucial to implement a framework that enables efficient monitoring, assurance and delivery of grid development and modernisation projects.

Clear and concise governance ensures consistency in delivery, driven by a structured hierarchy of decision-making, timely and accurate reporting, as well as clearly defined roles and responsibilities.

A strong governance framework also enables a consistent approach to key areas such as scope management, cost control, change management, schedule visibility and risk management. This not only ensures quality delivery but also allows grid system operators to adapt to evolving industry standards and shifting priorities. 

“A well-structured PMO provides the necessary capabilities to navigate complexities, allowing for more informed decision-making and empowering teams to plan effectively.”

It also fosters stronger relationships with an often-pressurised supply chain by understanding suppliers’ capacities and maturity levels, ultimately improving the organisation’s bargaining positions. 

In markets with rapid development, the temptation to rush delivery can be strong in order to accelerate project pipelines. However, the busier the regional pipeline, the more crucial it is to establish a comprehensive, integrated capital delivery framework that the PMO facilitates. While apparent shortcuts may seem to offer quick wins, they often lead to delays and increased costs in the long run.

Creating a realistic, bespoke digital strategy 

The complexity and scale of these programmes make digital strategy a necessity. Within the PMO, digital tools underpin modern project controls. They enable integrated cost and programme benchmarking and monitoring, including advanced performance metrics which provide historical and predictive reporting, to support informed decision making and better project management.  

The benefits of a digital strategy go beyond design and delivery into operation too. From drones that improve the safety and efficiency of working at height, to grid enhancing technology and the use of AI to automate and proactively manage capacity, we must lean on the tools at our disposal to reduce costs and risk. 

However, technological capabilities vary across regions and organisations.

“The first step in grasping the full potential of technology should be a digital maturity assessment. From there, we can create bespoke and realistic roadmaps towards becoming a high-performing digital enterprise, based on wider business objectives and where digital tools can have the most impact.”

This matters for both efficiency and security. Gradually building digital capabilities at a pace suitable for the organisation’s people and processes will ensure employees are bought in and trained to make best use of systems and data, securely. It will mean new tools or platforms can be implemented as quickly as possible without opening up security risks. 

As the sector that provides the backbone of critical infrastructure, cyber security must be our watchword. The rate of advancement is significant, both from those working to protect critical infrastructure and from those seeking to undermine it.

As bad actors become increasingly sophisticated, governments and businesses are racing to keep pace. In the US, for example, the Biden administration’s Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act funnelled US$2bn in funding for cybersecurity resilience and innovation in 2024 – US$30m specifically for tools to protect clean energy infrastructure. 

An organisation that understands its own capabilities and promotes a digital-first culture will be better placed to adopt new systems quickly, integrating them smoothly into current infrastructure, and shoring up their defences. 

Getting the right people in the right place 

From tools to people, the technical experience and understanding needed on these complex programmes are in short supply with fierce competition for resources globally.  

Attracting, training and investing in new, local talent will be crucial for markets to build long-term capacity and resilience. Governments are getting behind the need to develop local skills for the future – and to work in collaboration with the private sector to do so.  

In the UK, Sir Keir Starmer has recently launched Skills England, a body aimed at working with central and local government, as well as businesses and unions, to set out a national strategy and funding mechanism to build the skills we need for the future, while reducing reliance on overseas labour. 

Transmission and distribution must play a crucial part in this to protect the country’s energy security and decarbonisation goals. 

However, building new skills will take time – a luxury which governments cannot afford in their efforts to mitigate the impacts of geopolitical tensions on energy provision and to keep global temperatures from exceeding the 2°C above pre-industrial levels. 

In the immediate term, we need to think laterally about skills. To keep the current pipeline on track, we have to consider the expertise that already exists in adjacent, asset-intensive markets such as water or conventional energy. People in these areas already have the skills needed for the work in our sector, as well as the knowledge and technical aptitude that makes them easier to retrain and redeploy in transmission and distribution. 

“Understanding shared challenges across regions is essential. There are common issues and solutions around setting up for success, particularly on the development of skills and digital tools.”

It's important we lean on these global experiences and lessons while applying them through the lens of regional and national contexts. 

The sector faces an enormous task. To enable the largest overhaul of the electricity grid in generations, we must look up and out, learning from other sectors’ successes and failures, redeploying talent and setting ourselves up to implement the best technology in the construction and management of green energy grids.