ESO to allow projects to jump grid connections queue

Projects in the grid connection queue will be allowed to leapfrog one another, under reforms outlined by the Electricity System Operator (ESO).

The proposal is included within the ESO’s updated ‘First Ready, First Connected’ package of reforms, which was initially published last December to unblock congestion on the network.

The latest proposals include tightened up eligibility for grid connection offers, which the ESO claims could more than halve the number of projects in the queue.

The new rules will apply to all of the projects in the existing queue and new connection applications.

Under the proposed ‘TMO4+’ approach, only projects meeting ‘Gate 2’ criteria will be provided with a position in the queue and a connection date.

These criteria will include requirements to secure land rights for the proposed location and dates for submission of planning applications.

Each project, including new applicants, will be able to obtain a queue position after they have reached Gate 2, “irrespective of when they originally applied”, the ESO has proposed.

Capacity freed up by the new approach will be used to offer “better” connection dates to projects, which have already met the Gate 2 criteria, and those reaching this stage in the future.

Projects, which meet the less onerous Gate 1 competency requirements, will only be offered an indicative connection date.

But they will not be allocated supporting transmission reinforcement works, user commitment liabilities and securities, or queue management milestones.

In addition, the ESO is proposing that the indicative connection dates provided at Gate 1 will be subject to change and “may move backwards” if other projects progress faster.

In a further bid to speed up the queue, the document says the ESO is considering use of “financial instruments” at Gates 1 and 2 to encourage only viable projects to enter and remain in the connections process.

Projects in the existing queue will be given a period, prior to the implementation of the new package, to demonstrate whether they have met the new Gate 2 criteria. Those that do will have the option to retain their existing connection date or request an accelerated one.

The document says further Gate 2 criteria are being considered for technology and location in order to align the connections process with the upcoming Strategic Spatial Energy Plan, which the ESO is due to draw up this summer.

The ESO has said it will submit applications to Ofgem for the code modification proposals required to implement its grid connection reforms.

The ESO hopes to receive sign off on the proposed changes, which it has requested that the regulator should treat as urgent, by October in order to implement the new regime in January 2025.

The document says the ESO‘s latest proposals are a response to the ballooning size of the transmission connections queue, which has been growing at an average of more than 20GW a month over the last year, and looks set to reach 800GW by the end of 2024 – more than four times the amount of the required installed capacity anticipated by 2050.

It says the previously announced queue management measures, announced last December, were insufficient to tackle the “fast-growing nature of the queue [and] would not improve dates in the timescales needed to deliver on our objectives”.

“It is clear we need to go further and faster, with significant action required as soon as possible across the whole of the current queue,” the ESO document adds.

Earlier this month, National Grid’s transmission boss compared the current rush to secure grid connections to the toilet roll panic seen during the early stages of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Alice Delahunty, the grid’s UK electricity transmission president, said the barriers to obtaining a grid connection agreement are “incredibly low” which is exacerbating delays.

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