Page last updated on 16th March 2026

Energy by Everyone

Do you know how much electricity Britain produces on its own? The answer may shock you, but what's more of a surprise is how many Brits are unsure about where their energy comes from. That's why we're highlighting a few smart ways some people are helping improve Britain's energy system.

Where does our electricity come from?

Great Britain’s weather is helping us to lead the way in renewable energy. In fact, this sunny and windy island is actually a green and powerful land. According to the National Grid, Great Britain produces 93% of its electricity. What's more, 32% of our electricity is produced by wind, solar and hydropower. All of which are renewable resources!

Meeting our energy pioneers

Research tells us that 30% of us feel disconnected from how energy is made in Great Britain.* To help reconnect people to how energy is made, we've reached out to a few Brits who have taken it up amongst themselves to play their part in generating and managing energy with the help of a smart meter.

Watch Julia Bradbury meet one such pioneer, Aimee, below:

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: Julia Bradbury: Hello, I'm Julia Bradbury. In the UK we generate a whopping 93% of the electricity that we need. Increasingly, we are generating that power through renewables like wind and solar.

Today I've come to Beccles to meet Aimee and her mother-in-law, Andrea, to find out how she's generating power through solar panels on her roof and managing it through a smart meter.

Julia: Aimee, you generate your own energy, so how do you do that?

Aimee: For us, in order to make our bills cheaper and to be able to run our house more efficiently, we invested in solar panels and it's been fantastic.

Julia: Let's talk about the smart meter. Now, that isn't a smart meter behind you, that's the in-home display. What does that do for you?

Aimee: So that gives us access to the real-time data, to be able to understand what's coming into the house and what's going back out to the grid.

Andrea: It will feed data into something that is more beneficial for the network.

Aimee: The data that our meter sends back to the grid helps the grid make better decisions about where to put investment, that supports the whole of Great Britain.

Andrea: If locally we can do something to put power back into the grid, it should hopefully bring the cost of running the network down, which then makes the network more resilient but also enables bills to come down.

Julia: Smart meters will play an increasingly vital part in helping us manage the energy that we use more efficiently. And some of this could be generated by people like Aimee.

How do smart meters play a part?

Smart meters help us to predict where and when energy will be needed more accurately than traditional meters. This will allow Britain's energy system to better manage its energy. That means reducing energy waste and relying more on renewable energy where possible. They also help people to use energy in a more flexible way which could help you reduce your carbon footprint.

Do you know more about cheese or energy?

Even though Great Britain is among one of the world's leaders in renewable energy production, we don't seem to know about it. We surveyed 4000 people and found out that Brits know more about their cheese than their energy. In fact, the results surprised us so much that we decided to share the quiz so you can find out for yourself which topic you know more about...

Watch how well others did on the quiz...

So, will it be cheese or energy? Watch how well some people know their British cheese versus their British energy:

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: (Intro music begins and stays in the background throughout the video)

Produced on Welsh farms, this crumbly cheese is named after which of the country's towns?

Guest 1: Caerphilly.

Guest 2: Caerphilly.

Guest 3: Caerphilly.

Guest 4: Caerphilly.

Legally, which cheese can only be produced in either Derbyshire, Leicestershire, or Nottinghamshire?

Guest 5: Stilton.

Guest 6: Stilton.

Guest 7: I'd have thought Stilton.

Guest 8: Stilton?

Where was Great Britain's first commercial onshore wind farm built?

Guest 9: Erm...

Guest 10: [exhales]

Guest 11: Hmm... right.

Which country in Great Britain produces the most wind power?

Guest 1: [sillence]

Guest 12: [sillence]

Guest 13: Erm...

Do you know that by having a smart meter you are contributing to a more renewable, secure and independent energy system?

Guest 7: Yep, you've got to have a smart meter.

Guest 14: I do use it. Bit obsessed with it.

Guest 15: I was thinking about getting one the other day actually.

Guest 16: We actually do have one at home, yeah.

Guest 17: Everybody should have a smart meter.

Guest 3: We've got smartphones, smart TVs... why not smart meters?

[outro music plays and fades out]