Almost 400 businesses are using diesel generators and batteries because there is not enough capacity in the Dutch electricity net across the country to connect them, according to the Financieele Dagblad.

The problem, which the net providers expect to get worse, does not just affect businesses but increasingly domestic housing.

Companies involved in the energy transition themselves have long been having problems getting enough electricity for their businesses, the paper reports. Now, according to electricity net providers, almost 400 businesses in peak areas cannot get an electricity connection at all and are on a waiting list.

Housing is also affected, because in order to reduce the gas supply from Groningen and meet climate change targets, the government ruled in 2018 that new builds cannot use gas – increasing the demand on the electricity network.

Koninklijke Damstra Installatiebedrijf in Leeuwarden, which installs heat pumps and solar panels, told the FD it was warned that its electricity supply would be cut off if it didn’t reduce consumption, so the business has instead bought an emergency biomass generator.

Teake Damstra, commercial director, told the FD: ‘Things are completely upside down, because I am doing exactly what sustainable government wants!’

Net companies and local councils have been issuing increasingly urgent warnings to the Dutch state for the past year about running out of capacity.

This capacity is also an issue for heavy-use industry, such as a proposed data centre in Zeewolde for Facebook owner Meta, which is currently on hold after intervention from the senate called for planning on a national rather than regional level.