Largest electricity transmission project in UK’s history receives provisional approval

Ofgem, the UK energy market regulator, gave provisional regulatory approval on March 27, 2024, for the construction of Britain’s largest electricity transmission project in the nation’s history.

Namely, the project discussed is called Eastern Green Link 2 (EGL2) and it is going to be a subsea electricity connection, spanning some 500 kilometers between Aberdeenshire in Scotland and North Yorkshire in England, also making it the longest project of its kind to ever be realized in the UK.

Furthermore, roughly 436 kilometers of the 525 kV, 2 GW, cable will be laid underwater in the North Sea, while the remaining 70 km will be buried underground onshore.

The funding that has been proposed for the project by Ofgem is £3.4 billion, and is going to be subject to consultation until the 26^th of April, while the project’s total budget has been identified to be £4.3 billion.

It is worth noting that EGL2 received fast-track designation, under Ofgem’s new Accelerated Strategic Transmission Investment (ASTI) framework.

EGLE2 is only the second project where ASTI is put into practice, while the first one was the Eastern Green Link 1 (EGL1), another subsea interconnection between England and Scotland, that received a fast track package of £2 billion.

Both projects are rather similar, and will include converter stations on both sides, which will transform high voltage alternating current from the grid into high voltage direct current to be transported.