For three days this month, Britain had almost no wind. Transmission-metered wind averaged 1,016 MW on 7 November, 599 MW on the 8th and 738 MW on the 9th, from a fleet that has produced more than 18 GW in a single half-hour. Gas filled the hole: CCGT ran at 20–22.6 GW, day and night.
That is the textbook case for interconnectors. Britain has around ten gigawatts of cable to six countries, built in large part on the promise that when it is calm here it will be windy, or sunny, or nuclear-powered somewhere else, and the power will come.
Across the five days from 6 to 10 November, Britain was a net exporter. On average 381 MW more left the country than arrived.