grid
/ɡrɪd/ noun- The network that carries electricity from where it is made to where it is used.
- A pattern of lines that holds things in place.
21 September 2026 · Rotterdam · 1 minute
Both senses describe the same thing from different distances. Up close, the grid is copper, transformers and substations. From far away, it is a set of lines that decides what can go where.
A shared limit
A street has a cable, and the cable has a rating. Every heat pump, every oven and every car on that street draws from the same rating. Nobody owns the margin; everybody spends it.
That is why a waiting list for a connection is not a failure of planning but a description of physics. The planners can only move the limit by digging, and digging takes years.
What can move instead
If the cable cannot grow quickly, the load has to learn to wait. A car parked for nine hours needs perhaps two of them to charge. The other seven are the margin nobody has spent yet.
- Charge later, when the street is quiet.
- Charge slower, when the street is busy.
- Charge somewhere else, when the street is full.
Each of these is a small inconvenience to a driver and a large relief to a cable. The art is in asking for the first without anyone noticing it. See demand and curtailment.