ScottishPower today (Tuesday 01.01.02) began supplying electricity to Northern Ireland as the electricity interconnector between Scotland and the Province went in to commercial operation for the first time.

The first units to flow through the 500 Megawatt undersea link were part of a contract under which ScottishPower will supply Northern Ireland Electricity with 125 Megawatts of generation over the next 70 months.

ScottishPower already transmits electricity to England and Wales and following the completion of the Northern Ireland interconnector becomes the first generator to supply electricity to all the home nations simultaneously.

The project began more than 10 years ago and was completed to schedule despite construction delays to the overhead line programme caused by the Foot and Mouth epidemic.

Engineering advances have enabled the nominal capacity to be doubled to 500 Megawatts. Trading capacity will initially be limited to 300MW and is planned to increase to 400MW in October 2002.

As part of the overall project, ScottishPower has built the new, 64 km high voltage transmission line in south Ayrshire at a cost of £30 million and extended a large electricity substation at Coylton.

Northern Ireland Electricity, (part of Veridian group) with £100 million investment, laid 60km of undersea cables and built the "convertor" stations, at Auchencrosh in Ayrshire and Ballycronan More in Northern Ireland, which convert electricity from its normal A/C into D/C to reduce losses associated with transmitting electricity long distances and also provides additional protection for the Irish grid.

In addition to its long-term contract with NIE ScottishPower has been successful in bidding at auction for additional capacity to allow further export of Scottish generation over the first few months of 2001.

The company hopes the new link will enable them to win new retail customers in Northern Ireland once the electricity market there becomes fully open to competition in 2005 and to sell generation to Irish energy companies who will be able to use the interconnector to gain access to cheaper electricity from the UK wholesale energy market.

The interconnector will end electricity isolation in Northern Ireland and the benefits will be passed down the line to customers in the south, whose electricity grid connection with the NIE system is being upgraded from 170 MW to 600 MW.

Charles Berry Executive Director said, "The commissioning of the interconnector provides a tremendous trading opportunities for ScottishPower. It marks a significant achievement for the ScottishPower/NIE partnership and the opening of a new trade route will bring benefits not just to the companies involved but also to customers and suppliers on both sides of the Irish Sea. This was a magnificent engineering achievement carried out to budget and with consideration to the environment"

Further Information:

Gordon Laidlaw                                            07850 634841 
Simon McMillan                                            07753622 257 
ScottishPower Press Office                                0141 248 8200