The UK’s energy regulator Ofgem has approved a $4.35 billion (£3.4 billion) funding to fast-track an electricity superhighway—a major subsea and underground cable project between Scotland and Yorkshire in England that could power up to 2 million British homes.
The funding package that Ofgem announced on Tuesday is part of the regulator’s Accelerated Strategic Transmission Investment (ASTI) framework, which is fast-tracking 26 major connection projects aimed at boosting the UK’s grid capacity. The expanded capacity could deliver estimated savings of $1.92 billion (£1.5 billion).
The Scotland-Yorkshire electricity superhighway, officially named Eastern Green Link 2 (EGL2), is the first of 26 projects to complete a fast-track process to secure funding through Ofgem’s new ASTI framework.
EGL2 will deliver a 2-GW high voltage electricity ‘superhighway’ cable link between Peterhead in Aberdeenshire and Drax in North Yorkshire, which will help harness the potential of British offshore wind power, Ofgem said in a statement. Most of the cable will be under the North Sea with the remaining buried underground onshore.
The project is being jointly developed by Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks Transmission (SSENT) and National Grid Electricity Transmission (NGET). Work on the project is expected to begin later this year and to be completed by 2029.
“Ofgem is fully committed to supporting the government to meet its aims of getting clean power by 2030,” Ofgem’s CEO Jonathan Brearley said.
“Today’s announcement is a further step in putting the regulatory systems and processes in place to speed up network regulation to achieve its aim.”
At the end of last year, National Grid, the UK’s power systems operator, said it is accelerating the connection of up to 20 gigawatts (GW) of clean energy projects to its electricity transmission and distribution networks in England and Wales as part of a collaborative UK plan to speed up and reform connections.
By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com
