Britain set a new record for electricity imports last month.

That’s according to research by the energy market analyst EnAppSys, which suggests on 20th August at 12.20 pm the country reached a peak of 5.8GW.

The authors of the report attribute the record to the amount of Irish electricity exported to Britain and the trial imports coming from the NSL link to Norway ahead of its commercial go-live date on 1st October.

The so-called NSL link is expected to give Britain access to cheap and green hydropower from Western Norway.

The study also forecasts that the high volumes of British power imports are likely to become more frequent as interconnector capacity increases.

Phil Hewitt, Director of EnAppSys, said: “At Christmas Great Britain will have 8.4GW of installed cables from other markets, meaning that around 25% of the electricity we need could come from overseas.

“This increases the likelihood of import volumes hitting new highs in the next few months. It also means that on Christmas Day this year we could be relying on foreign power to cook our turkeys!”