Hinkley Connection Project wins major community award

9th February 2021 - Community spirit

National Grid’s Hinkley Connection Project has secured the Community Investor Award at the 2020 Utility Week Awards.

The Utility Week Awards celebrate and reward the hard work and commitment of everyone in the utilities industry. This year’s ceremony, on Monday 8 February, was a virtual celebration of companies, teams and individuals keeping the country’s essential services running through the challenges of 2020.

The Hinkley Connection will connect more than six million homes and businesses to low-carbon energy. Working with local authorities and communities impacted by its construction, the project’s community programme focuses on: inspiring pupils through science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM) education; supporting the long-term unemployed into paid work; and, providing grants for a range of local community, charity and environmental projects.

Supporting people and communities

So far, the Hinkley Connection Project has:

supported 213,663 young people, including 41,469 disadvantaged pupils, through its STEM education fund
contributed over £520,000 for community, charity, and environmental projects
delivered £195,000 worth of training for almost 200 local individuals struggling to find sustainable employment – 49% of trainees have secured employment
reinvested over £3 million in the community by hiring local contractors to work on the project.

James Goode, Project Director, said: “The Hinkley Connection is not only a vital infrastructure and a key part of the transition to net zero but also a community engagement programme, designed to help break down socio-economic boundaries, inspire the next generation of engineers and leave a lasting legacy for the communities we are working in.

“We’re incredibly proud to be recognised in this way. The award win reflects the significant impact that the programme has already had on helping locals get into employment, engaging school children in STEM subjects and giving back through our grant programme.”

Fielding a strong line-up of entries

We had a strong line-up of entries in this year’s awards, with three of our projects shortlisted in addition to our recognition as Community Investor of 2020.

The following projects were also shortlisted:

Supply Chain Excellence: Capital Delivery’s Sensible Monitoring System
Capital Project of the Year: Sellindge and the River Humber Pipeline Replacement project (Feeder 9)

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