SSEN-Transmission Blog: Powering Scotland’s Green Future

Across the UK, there is growing recognition of the need to generate sustainable economic growth and ensure that the benefits are shared fairly among communities. SSEN Transmission is proud to play a central role in delivering these ambitions in the north of Scotland.

While there is healthy debate about the best path to achieve these goals, there is broad consensus that the transition to a clean power future is essential — both for our economy and our energy security. By investing in low-carbon, homegrown electricity, we can create affordable energy, high-quality jobs, and new opportunities for communities across the country.

A report earlier this year commissioned by the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit showed that the “net-zero economy” is booming in the UK as never before – growing by 10 per cent in one year: light years ahead of the rest of the economy. And this net-zero economy is especially important to Scotland, supporting more than 100,000 full-time equivalent jobs.

Upgrading the electricity transmission grid to enable this transition to clean power is at the heart of this economic growth. The SSEN Transmission network in the north of Scotland is central to that mission, with the potential capability to meet a fifth of Great Britain’s demand for clean power.

As a business rooted in Scotland, with a proud Highland heritage stretching back decades, we take our responsibility to work in partnership with the communities we serve extremely seriously. That means delivering economic benefits and other gains for the north of Scotland from hosting our electricity transmission infrastructure.

Last year, we were proud to open a new offshore hub in our Inverness office as we continue on our exciting path of growth, helping to bring our supply chain to the Highlands.

This spring, we also opened a cutting-edge £17 million operations warehouse in Inverness, a vital new hub designed to bolster the resilience and efficiency of the north of Scotland’s high-voltage electricity transmission network.

A big illustration of the benefits of upgrading the grid is the jobs boost for the Highlands from Sumitomo’s investment in a new cable manufacturing facility in Nigg, underpinned by our Shetland 2 High Voltage Direct Current (HVDC) link project.

Also important was our recent announcement of a maintenance framework for our sites, inviting local contractors in the Highlands and elsewhere in the north of Scotland to apply to tender for this work.

And this autumn, we welcomed a record number of new graduates into our business, where we have grown from just 400 employees in 2019 to 2,500 and still growing today, many of whom are based in the Highlands.

These are just some examples of the good quality careers and economic activity that upgrading the grid is generating.

As a business, we also expect to invest more than £100m in community benefit funding and we are determined to ensure that the funding goes to priority projects of local people.

We have plans to devote a similar sum to nature restoration across our network – making SSEN Transmission the biggest single investor in nature in Scotland – and support the delivery of 1,000 permanent homes for people in the north of Scotland as a legacy of our construction projects.

It’s all about working in partnership to achieve a win-win: winning clean power and energy security for the country, and winning jobs and economic opportunities for the Highlands.