Decarbonisation of buildings, transport and industry is increasing and long-term, the fundamentals are strong.
ADE: Demand is the UK's largest non-profit trade body for demand representing 150 organisations that use, manage and optimise energy demand. We work to ensure consumers and industry play a central role in delivering a cleaner, more flexible and more affordable energy system.
Currently, generation and storage still dominate thinking in the major energy debates of our day: in the role of market signals, centralised planning, connections reform.
We're building renewable energy at record speed, but we're not getting the full value from it, we're wasting power. In the first nine months of 2026, we have already surpassed £1.5 billion in curtailment costs - that is turning off wind and turning up gas. That doesn't make sense for bills, it doesn't make sense for energy security and it doesn't make sense for growth.
ADE: Demand exists to fix this. Our members - from industrial sites to flexibility aggregators to thermal storage companies - are the technologies that can help balance the grid while lowering their own costs.
By running our energy system more efficiently and rewarding demand, we can save households £115 a year by 2030 and £375 by 2040.
We're here to make sure the rules work for consumers and for Britain, treating demand as a solution, designing markets where every home and business can play a part in our clean energy future and modernising a system designed for a bygone era, so it works around people, businesses and industry.
What can demand-side technologies offer the UK?
At ADE: Demand, we represent various strands of the energy sector, from flexibility aggregators and thermal storage providers to industrial sites.
Consumer-led flexibility is the fastest, cheapest way to lower bills, boost energy security and hit our 2030 clean power targets. Unlocking this in our homes and businesses is the equivalent of building 16 new gas plants – but faster, cheaper and without a single dedicated subsidy.
Half of Britain's industrial emissions come from dispersed sites across the UK who sit outside the Government's designated industrial clusters. These sites have no dedicated plan and no direct support to decarbonise. That risks 770,000 direct jobs and up to 3.6 million indirect jobs.
Many flats, terraced houses and leasehold properties often can't fit an outside unit such as a heat pump to decarbonise their heating, particularly those living in cities. For these homes, thermal storage is a great alternative. Thermal storage stores electricity as heat, works with existing radiators and charges overnight when power is cheaper.
What does ADE: Demand advocate for?
ADE: Demand seeks a complete re-imagining of the role of demand in our energy system so that:
Demand is given equal consideration to generation.
Every household, commercial business and industrial site has a commercially viable path to decarbonisation.
Energy users and their assets have a day job - they shouldn't have to work around the energy system, the energy system should work around them.
Millions of users with automated provision can play a major part in keeping the lights on.
In Summer 2026, ADE: Demand published three reports:
'Powered by People, Powered by Place' - setting out ADE: Demand's vision for Regional Energy Strategic Plans (RESPs)
'Connection Costs: What Industrial & Commercial Businesses are Afraid Of' - ADE: Demand research which has found that industrial and commercial businesses cannot obtain, early enough to support a credible investment decision, an estimate of what a new or upgraded electricity connection is likely to cost.
'No Home Left Behind' - ADE: Demand research which has found lower-income families are being asked to pay nearly five times more than wealthier households to make the switch to clean heating and outlines recommendations in respect of thermal storage.
