National Grid has announced an investment of £700,000 in the Newhouse primary substation where a second high voltage transformer is being installed.
The upgrade to the substation in the Bulwark area of Chepstow, South Wales, will add an extra 7MW of electricity capacity, and “will ensure the local network can cope with the rising demand for electricity from homes and businesses in the years ahead,” National Grid said in a statement.
The improvements to the substation will help the Welsh government to meet targets for more electric vehicle charging points, and will ensure that new grid connections can be made with nearby solar farms.
The company said that the reliability of power supplies to 2,200 local homes and businesses would be improved by the investment.
On April 19, National Grid announced a ‘Great Grid Upgrade’ which it said would see “significant new infrastructure built across England and Wales to move more clean energy from where it’s generated to where it’s needed, helping the UK meet its net zero ambitions and reduce its reliance on fossil fuels.”
Mark Mears, National Grid’s green recovery project manager, said, “forecasts for electricity usage in the area shows demand is set to grow steadily over the next 10 years. This green recovery investment project serves a dual purpose. It provides network resilience and will enable us to meet that demand which is likely to be led by more people switching to electric vehicles and heat pumps.”
The work will be completed this spring and is part of a UK-wide ‘Green Recovery Scheme’ to deliver the government’s net zero targets.
National Grid said its Green Recovery Scheme would deliver “over 70 investment projects across National Grid Electricity Distribution’s (NGED) region” over the next two years.
The projects will “support the country’s path to Net Zero, enabling more green developments, such as electric vehicle chargers, mass heat pump installations and renewable generation, such as solar parks, to connect to the electricity network.”
National Grid has published a map of all the schemes it is working on as part of the programme.
