Six chosen for £2bn-worth of National Grid electricity work

Winners and losers are emerging in the battle for almost £2bn worth of work in the first phase of National Grid’s plans to upgrade its ageing electricity network.

A total of six groups have made it to preferred bidder status, with their contracts expected to be formally ratified in January.

The framework deal has been broken down into two separate packages substation construction and refurbishment work, plus overhead transmission line tasks.

The preferred bidders are listed in the box below, while National Grid is understood to have has unplugged pitches from Balfour Beatty, a Costain/United Utilities/MWH team and a KBR/Nuttall/Gleeson line-up for the substation work and short-circuited a bid from Morgan Est/Vinci/Capita for the overhead line work.

Half a dozen deals are involved, with these mirroring National Grid’s Gas Alliances. Each contract will initially run for five years, with the possibility of an extension for a further five years.

The overhead transmission line scheme has been divided up into two regions.

The eastern and western areas are worth up to £900m for the five-year span of the contracts.

The substation packages involve four contracts covering four regions the South East, Midlands, North and South West/Wales areas, and are worth up to £1.1bn.

In simple termns, the contracts will take in a vast swathe of tasks. The substation work will consist mainly of extension work on brownfield sites. The overhead line tasks will range from refurbishing lines, to replacing out-of-date pylons and rusted metal.

NATIONAL GRID WINNERS

Substation work

• ABB/Morgan Est/Atkins
• Areva/Skanska/Mott MacDonald
• Mitsubishi/Morrison/Jacobs
• Siemens/Parsons Brinckerhoff Power/Murphy

Overhead line

• Amec (WesternSouth-west and Wales region)
• Balfour Beatty (Eastern region)

[Contract Journal, 25 October 2006, p 1]