Users should be at the heart of system resilience strategies says Greg Jackson
Pamela Largue
Posted on: 18 November 2025
Octopus Energy chief says energy system resilience should be about protecting the consumer, just like a vehicle crumple safety test.
At the opening of Enlit Europe 2025, Greg Jackson, CEO of Octopus Energy, stated that the European energy system should behave more like a crumple test.
Why? Because a vehicle crumple test is designed to protect the person, not the car.
And that is the perspective the sector should adopt to increase resilience, he believes.
Illustrating his point by sharing pictures of a crumple test of a 1959 pre-crumple zone Chevrolet and a post-crumple zone Malibu, Jackson explained his analogy in more detail:
"The more and more rigid we make it, the more and more that we layer on layer after layer after layer of gold plating, the less flexibility we have, because what matters is not the energy system. It's the people who are using energy, the households and businesses who need the energy, and that's why we can use flexibility to protect them."
Jackson was highlighting some of the key risks facing the European energy landscape.
He started by mentioning the reliance on China, increasing extreme weather events, as well as instability of European policy.
"Europe, in my lifetime, has never been less politically stable. Many of our major governments are facing continuous political challenges, and many of those are resulting in energy policies that have gone more backwards and forwards than the Hokey Cokey."
However, while these issues are pressing, he believes that high gas prices in Europe are a main issue, threatening not only industry but also the consumer.
The consumer is suffering, he says, and resilience strategies should focus squarely on ensuring a supply of reliable, green and affordable energy.
Jackson stressed that a decentralised system that can leverage EVs, storage and heat pumps, for example, will provide greater resilience, stabilise the grid and reduce bills.
And one way Octopus is reducing bills is by giving people who live near wind turbines discounts when it is windy.
“It turns NIMBYS into YIMBYS as consumers realise the benefits of renewables,” says Jackson
"The point is, resilience, both physical resilience and democratic resilience, is best delivered by having a consumer-centric, decentralised, smart system, and it's here today."
After all, customers are the “bargain hunters looking for cheaper electricity.”
