£3 Billion Contracts Signed for UK's Largest HVDC Project
National Grid Electricity Transmission (NGET) and SSEN Transmission have signed contracts totalling nearly £3 billion for the delivery of Eastern Green Link 3 (EGL3), the largest electricity transmission project of its kind ever undertaken in the United Kingdom.
The contracts confirm Hitachi Energy as the delivery partner for the HVDC converter stations in Aberdeenshire, Scotland, and West Norfolk, England, and NKT as the delivery partner for the subsea and underground cable that will link the converter stations.
The deals cover delivery of a 690 km HVDC link, including approximately 580 km offshore between Scotland and England, with a capacity of up to 2 GW — sufficient to power around two million homes. The cable system will operate at 525 kV using VSC technology.
NKT's contract, valued at more than EUR 2.2 billion, is the largest single project award in the company's history. The scope is turnkey, covering the design, manufacture, and installation of the full HVDC power cable system across both the offshore and onshore sections of the route, with commissioning targeted for the end of 2033.
Hitachi Energy's role covers both converter stations at the termination points of the link. Niklas Persson, managing director of Hitachi Energy's business unit grid integration, stated that what sets the partnership apart is its focus on long-term planning, enabling the company to scale human capabilities, coordinate with suppliers, and align the entire value chain well in advance.
The project is being positioned as a response to a growing practical challenge in the UK's energy transition: renewable generation is increasingly concentrated offshore and along the east coast — particularly in Scotland — while demand is spread across the country. A report published in 2025 revealed that over 12 terawatt hours of renewable power was curtailed due to the disconnect between renewable generation and grid infrastructure capacity.
Mark Brackley, EGL3 Project Director at National Grid, described the contract signing as a major milestone, noting the investment would reduce constraint costs, strengthen energy security, and support jobs and economic growth across the regions.
The contract award comes just days after National Grid stretched its five-year financial plan to at least £70 billion through fiscal 2031, agreed to Ofgem's RIIO-T3 price-control settlement, and raised its earnings per share growth target for FY27 to between 13% and 15%.
EGL3 is one of several HVDC links being developed along the east coast of Britain as part of the wider Eastern Green Links programme. The previous month, National Grid announced the award of a £2 billion contract to Italy's Prysmian for EGL4's cable, which will connect Fife in Scotland to Norfolk in England. Prysmian is also supplying cable for the 2 GW EGL1 project between Torness in Scotland and Hawthorn Pit in England, which started construction in 2025.
On the planning front, the converter station site in Scotland has already obtained planning in principle via the Netherton Hub process, while the English works have undergone two rounds of public consultation, with a formal planning application for the English element expected to be submitted later this year. Subject to approval by the Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero, construction is due to begin in 2028, with the link expected to be energised in 2033.
