SSEN boosts Southampton’s low-carbon goals and economic growth with £8 million network upgrade

• Newly-completed £8m upgrade provides more electricity capacity for homes and businesses
• New transformers and underground lines mean the area's network is now even more reliable
• The project was completed in just 16 months

More than 7,500 customers in Southampton are now benefitting from a significantly improved local power supply following the completion of a multi-million-pound upgrade to the local infrastructure in the North Baddesley area by Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks (SSEN) Distribution.

Delivered in partnership with the Freedom Group of Companies Ltd - as design and build contractor - the £8 million project has opened up an additional 47.8 MVA (Megavolt-Ampere) of capacity. This is supporting new electricity connections and enabling more people and businesses to take up low-carbon technologies like electric vehicles, solar panels, and heat pumps, in line with Southampton’s own low-carbon goals.

The project in detail

Taking just over 16 months to complete, the programme has included the design and build of a new substation including two state-of-the-art transformers. Nearly 7 kilometres of cable, which had previously been part of the overhead cable network running between North Baddesley and Rownham, has also been put underground.

This modernisation of the existing network means local power supplies are now even more resilient and flexible. This reduces the risk of power cuts by future-proofing power supplies against more severe and unpredictable weather conditions.

Tim Eccleston, SSEN’s Project Manager for the works said:

“In addition to contributing to the low-carbon goals for the wider area of Southampton, our decision to reroute a significant stretch of overhead lines underground has improved the landscape and visual amenity for the local community. The extra capacity that’s now available to homes and businesses locally will help deliver longer-term benefits for people in the local area, by supporting their ability to move away from old and polluting means of heating and transport, and replacing them with low-carbon options like heat pumps and EVs.

“Our team’s delighted to have completed this significant upgrade to Southampton’s electricity infrastructure, and we’d like to thank the residents and companies in the vicinity of the works for their patience and understanding while we carried out this modernisation on their behalf.”

To find out more about SSEN’s £155 million investment to transform Southampton’s electricity infrastructure, go to: We're investing £155m to support economic growth and decarbonisation in Southampton - SSEN