Today, National Grid’s Ben Wilson, President of National Grid Ventures confirmed that if the project proceeds, Nautilus would connect at the Isle of Grain, Kent – READ the National Grid Press Release HERE
This follows on from Ofgem’s announcement that it has approved the Initial Project Assessment for the Nautilus interconnector (Offshore Hybrid Asset) to connect at Isle of Grain, Kent – READ the Press Release HERE
READ related press articles here by EADT, offshore-energy.biz and renews.biz, and for those with Facebook you can WATCH this VIDEO of Jenny Riddell-Carpenter welcoming this positive decision in Parliament with great clarity.
SEAS and Offshore4sure HAIL THIS BREAKTHROUGH ANNOUNCEMENT.
At last, this is a signal towards a more robust and enlightened solution, using pre-industrialised sites such as Grain.
We have promoted the Grain site for Nautilus over the last three years as it makes better sense for environmental, economic and social reasons. The fact that National Grid Ventures have presented this solution today, has implications for other projects including ScottishPower SPR’s EA1N and EA2 and LionLink, as there are other brownfield sites, better suited than the Suffolk coast and countryside, to host wind energy infrastructure.
We have always stated that Sea Link, a subsea HVDC cable to remove excess energy from Suffolk closer to where it is needed and will be used in South East England, would be redundant (saving c.£1.8bn), if these other projects didn’t come to the Suffolk coast, but instead went directly via subsea cables to brownfield sites nearer to London and the South East.
We must continue to challenge these other plans. It makes sense to use brownfield sites closer to London as we have stated in our Open Letter to Chris Stark and Fintan Slye and in our Mission Paper: The Great British Offshore Grid
Today’s news might also give some evidence of our feedback working, Ben Wilson of National Grid said in the National Grid press release that “Community and stakeholder feedback has been essential to the evolution of Nautilus. We have always advocated for the Isle of Grain as the best location for Nautilus given it’s already a major hub for energy infrastructure and has the potential to offer the shortest offshore cable route to Belgium. This view was reinforced by community and stakeholder feedback.”
In addition, SEAS wrote a response letter to Ofgem about their Nautilus update of 15 July, in which we strongly objected to their then decision to send Nautilus back to Suffolk from Isle of Grain, which might also have made a difference (see original Blog HERE).
This news is most important and encouraging but not enough, we still have to push for a truly holistic solution for the other projects currently aimed at the Suffolk coast.