National Grid sits at the heart of Britain’s energy system, connecting millions of people and businesses to the energy they use every day. We bring energy to life – in the heat, light and power we bring to our customer’s homes and businesses; in the way that we support our communities and help them to grow; and in the way we show up in the world. It's our vision to be at the heart of a clean, fair and affordable energy future.

National Grid is a group of companies, and one of those companies, National Grid Electricity Transmission (NGET), owns, builds and maintains the network in England and Wales. It is NGET who is developing plans for the Walpole Substation expansion project.

Within the National Grid Group there are other distinctly separate legal entities, each with their individual responsibilities and roles. More information about National Grid can be found on the ‘about us’ section of National Grid’s website.

National Grid Electricity Transmission (NGET) owns, builds and maintains the high-voltage electricity transmission network in England and Wales. This network operates primarily at 400,000 volts (400kV) and 275,000 volts (275kV).

Follow this link to learn more about NGET - https://www.nationalgrid.com/electricity-transmission/#:~:text=We%20own%20and%20maintain%20the,to%20the%20electricity%20you%20need

The ESO is the Electricity System Operator for Great Britain. The ESO makes sure we all have the essential energy we need by ensuring supply meets demand every second of every day. 

Generators of electricity apply to the ESO when they wish to connect to the high-voltage electricity network and the ESO leads the work to consider how the network may need to evolve to deliver a cleaner, greener future. In April 2019, the ESO became a legally separate business within the National Grid Group and is regulated independently by Ofgem.

Follow this link to find out more about ESO - https://www.nationalgrideso.com/what-we-do/becoming-national-energy-system-operator-neso

The Great Grid Upgrade is the largest overhaul of the electricity grid in generations. Our infrastructure projects across England and Wales are helping to connect more renewable energy to your homes and businesses. It will help the UK switch to clean energy and make sure our electricity network is fit for the future; carrying more clean, secure energy from where it’s generated to where it is needed. 

The Great Grid Upgrade will play a significant part in meeting the UK Government’s plans to power all homes and businesses with green energy by 2030 ensuring our electricity network is fit for the future. 

Follow this link to find out more - https://www.nationalgrid.com/the-great-grid-upgrade

The Walpole Substation expansion is required to accommodate new infrastructure at the existing substation. The work will be essential to connect new sources of renewable energy, manage power flows on the network and support future demand.  We will also be upgrading the existing technology, which was originally installed when the substation was built in the 1960s. 

During construction we will need to carry out a range of temporary activities such as creating equipment storage areas and site offices. Road and public rights of way diversions will also need to be implemented. Before we do this, we will prepare a construction management plan that will set out controls and measures to reduce our impact on the local community. 

We will work closely with the local community to minimise the impact of our project, where we can, and we will support community initiatives in areas where we are working to deliver social, economic or environmental benefits. We will write to local residents with more information on construction traffic routes and our working hours closer to construction starting.

No - people living near the infrastructure will not receive money off their bills or direct payments because of the projects. It is our job to upgrade the network so people can continue to take for granted the energy they use every day. 

However, we are committed to engaging with communities to ensure the projects deliver other localised benefits, including social benefits via our Community Grant Programme and environmental benefits via biodiversity net gain (i.e., increasing biodiversity in the area we are operating in above what is currently there). 

The Community Grant Programme is run by the National Grid Electricity Transmission (NGET) business. The programme is aimed at community organisations and charities in areas where our work is impacting local people through our operations and construction activities.

Communities impacted by the maintenance of existing infrastructure (e.g. refurbishment of overhead lines or substations resulting in road closures and other impacts) can apply for grants of up to £10,000.

You can read more about the Community Grant Programme here: https://www.nationalgrid.com/responsibility/community/community-grant-programme

We are carrying out assessments for the proposed expansion of Walpole Substation, evaluating its impact on the local environment. These assessments will help us to understand what mitigations we need to put in place to help reduce our impact on the local environment. 

We are also committed to ensuring a 10% Biodiversity Net Gain, which means that the local environment will be left in an improved biodiverse state than before the start of the project. This will be achieved by a range of measures, such as habitat creation and enhancement for protected species. 

We will carry out a comprehensive environmental impact assessment, meeting legal requirements under the environmental impact assessment (EIA) regulations. This will be included as part of the planning application for the project.

No - EGL 3 and 4 is a separate project. The expansion is required to connect new customers and meet future demand. As with all energy projects in the region, EGL 3 and 4 will benefit from the improvements and the expansion of Walpole Substation but it is not directly involved. We are liaising with the EGL 3 and 4 project team to keep disruption to local communities to a minimum.

We are aware of several consultation and energy infrastructure projects taking place in the region and at the same time. To help reduce fatigue associated with back-to-back consultations, we wanted to present both EGL 3 and 4 and Walpole Substation expansion together to reduce the impact on local people’s time.

No, it is not linked to Grimsby to Walpole either, but we will continue to work with our colleagues on this scheme to coordinate activities and reduce impacts where we can.

Walpole Substation expansion was not shared at the Grimsby to Walpole consultation as these proposals were at a more advanced stage at that time and must be progressed with its own timescale as it addresses different network requirements.

We will be analysing your feedback and refining our proposals ahead of submitting a planning application in July 2024. Construction on the permitted development elements of the project is due to start on site in September 2024. The elements of the project requiring planning approval will progress once planning consent is granted, which we are hoping will enable construction to begin in November 2024.

We will develop a traffic management plan that will set out how we plan to reduce our time on the roads, the routes we take and where we should park. We will work closely with the local authority and take guidance from them to further reduce our impact – examples included restricting our vehicle movements to certain times of the day to avoid busy periods. This will be submitted as part of our planning application.