The NorthConnect project of a Norwegian consortium has obtained a licence from the UK energy regulator Ofgem. Developers plan to connect the UK and Norway with a 550 km long underwater cable. New HV cable should be able to transport up to 1.4 GW of electricity from Norwegian hydro power plants. The project should be completed by 2022.
The UK is currently connected to France, the Netherlands, Ireland and Northern Ireland using power cables. The total capacity of the cables is 4 GW. According to the British government, it is necessary to increase the capacity of interconnectors by another 9 MW to improve security of electricity supply.
The four Norwegian companies in the NorthConnect consortium are Vattenfall, Agder Energi, E-CO and Lyse. Energy from the new interconnector can come in handy to the UK in case of reduced output of wind power plants or unplanned outage of conventional power plants.
The UK can on the other hand use the new interconnector to export excess energy (e.g. overnight) to Norway, which can store it in its pumped-storage hydro power plants.
-tk-