The energy watchdog has given the green light to plans to build a £260 million electricity link from Orkney in a significant boost for the renewable energy industry.
The link to be built by SSE’s networks division could be completed by 2023 will enable new wind farms and potentially new tidal power projects on Orkney to send electricity to the rest of Britain.
Approval granted by regulator Ofgem is conditional on a total of at least 135MW of new wind farm projects on Orkney either being awarded a contract under the UK’s renewable energy subsidy scheme or being judged likely to be developed by December 2021.
Orkney is not connected to the GB electricity transmission system and there is currently no spare capacity to connect new electricity generation on the local distribution network. Under the project, a subsea cable would run between Orkney and Caithness.
