National Grid has selected seven companies to support infrastructure projects under its Great Grid Upgrade programme to overhaul the UK’s electricity grid.
The companies will be part of National Grid’s new Great Grid Partnership. They will support the design and construction of nine major electricity infrastructure projects that will connect the UK grid to new offshore wind farms.
An Aecom-Arup joint venture and WSP have joined the Great Grid Partnership as design and consenting service partners.
Laing O’Rourke, Morgan Sindall Infrastructure, Morrison Energy Services, Murphy and Omexom/Taylor Woodrow have joined the partnership as construction partners.
The partnership will be collaborative and bring together National Grid’s supply chain partners in a new “enterprise model”.
National Grid has said that the purpose of the partnership is to speed up the delivery of national electricity infrastructure. It will allow each supplier to pool their resources, skills, insights and experience to deliver projects faster and more economically.
The nine Accelerated Strategic Transmission Investment (ASTI) projects covered by the partnership are:
- Norwich to Tilbury North
- Norwich to Tilbury South
- North Humber to High Marnham
- Grimsby to Walpole
- Chesterfield to Willington
- Brinsworth to High Marnham
- Tilbury to Grain and Tilbury to Kingsnorth
- Pentir to Trawsfynydd (cable replacement)
- Pentir to Trawsfynydd (second circuit)
Many of the projects will involve the construction of new high voltage overhead lines and reinforcement of the existing ones.
The Tilbury to Grain project will involve the replacement of the existing 1960s Thames Cable Tunnel beneath the River Thames between Tilbury and Gravesend.
A National Grid spokesperson said that the appointed design and construction partners would be expected to carry out ground engineering and geotechnical works on the nine projects.
However, they said it was too early to give any specific detail on what works each supply chain partner would carry out, as the nine projects covered by the partnership are at various stages of planning and consultation.
The spokesperson said: “The Great Grid Partnership is still at a relatively early stage with some of the nine projects covered by the partnership not yet in, or at very early stages of public consultation, meaning the exact route is not determined which would affect types of engineering and ground works required.”
Commenting on the partnership announcement, National Grid president of strategic infrastructure Carl Trowell said: “This Great Grid Partnership is a ground-breaking initiative from National Grid that places our supply chain partners at the heart of our infrastructure upgrade programme. All our chosen partners have an established history of successful collaboration in delivering major projects and enabling innovation to thrive.
“By sharing best practice and collaborating across nine of our critical major ASTI infrastructure projects, we will set the gold-standard for future infrastructure projects in terms of driving innovation, shoring up capacity across the skills base, operating responsibly and sustainably and ultimately in getting the best value for consumers.”
Other notable infrastructure projects across England and Wales that National Grid is gearing up to deliver include the Eastern Green Link projects. As part of these projects, hundreds of kilometres of onshore and offshore high voltage direct current (HDVC) electrical cables will be installed between Scotland and England to link offshore windfarms to the grid.
Eastern Green Link 2 (EGL2), which will be the longest HVDC cable in the UK at 436km long, received planning consent in August last year.