Detailed plans, including pictures visualising how 50-metre-high pylons could alter the landscape of Essex’s countryside, have been published as part of proposals to build a new transmission route between Norwich and Tilbury.
The pylons plan
There are several new windfarms in the works off the East Anglian coast, with most of the electricity generated, destined for London and the southeast. The National Grid project aims to reinforce its transmission network between the existing Norwich Main Substation in Norfolk and the Tilbury Substation in Essex, via its Bramford Substation, the new East Anglia Connection Node (EACN) Substation, and the new Tilbury North Substation.
National Grid states that the new pylons are necessary because the existing transmission network, even with current upgrades, will not have sufficient capacity to accommodate all the renewable projects currently in the pipeline. While a substantial proportion is expected to be generated by offshore wind, huge planned solar farms in Norfolk will also require additional transmission capacity over the next decade and beyond.
If the application receives development consent, construction is expected to start in 2027 and is anticipated to take approximately four years. The proposed route can be viewed here.
The Essex route
Part of the proposed route of the Tilbury to Norwich pylon development will cut along the edge of a planned, new large-scale housing development. Dunton Hills Garden Village, near West Horndon in Essex is expected to provide up to 4,000 homes and 55,000m2 of business space. Brentwood Borough Council says the new transmission line has the potential to “seriously undermine the delivery of the allocation and its legacy as a garden community”.
Elsewhere in Essex, people in Chelmsford worry the pylons could threaten an ancient settlement near Little and Great Waltham. It’s thought the settlement could be as old as Stonehenge, but the pylons could carve through it as it does not have a protected status.
National Grid here have shown before and after pictures of a views from Dunton Hills, Little and Great Waltham, Little Tey, Silver End, Fordham, East Gores and Feeringbury Manor.
Opposition
National Grid’s plans to build 183 km of pylons through Essex have been met with considerable opposition from councils, local MPs and opposition groups along the route.
Essex County Council has said National Grid’s current plans for the Norwich to Tilbury pylon project remain “wide of the mark of what is acceptable” to the people of Essex and fail to consider the long-term impact it would have on the county, with very little offered by way of social value and community benefits.
Rosie Pearson, an environmental campaigner based in Essex wrote on the Essex, Suffolk and Norfolk Pylons Facebook group: “National Grid has produced some more useless graphics. This time they have shown what the pylons will look like from viewpoints, but have removed all landscape features, making it meaningless, and giving no concept of scale. So I have added a church and an oak tree for comparison.”
Past energy supplies in East Anglia
East Anglia’s 400 kilovolt (kV) electricity transmission network was built in the 1960s. It was built to supply regional demand, centred on Norwich and Ipswich.
For many years, the only significant power stations generating electricity in the East Anglia region were the Sizewell A and subsequent Sizewell B nuclear power stations, as well as the Spalding North and Sutton Bridge gas-fired power stations, and several smaller 132 kV connected gas-fired power stations.
The need for capacity is expected to grow substantially in the coming years, with new offshore and – with Sizewell C recently getting the green light – new nuclear generation. In the East Anglia region, connection agreements have been signed for approximately 27 gigawatts of new generation capacity.
Future needs
A statement from National Grid says: “Without reinforcement, the capacity of the East Anglia and South East existing network is insufficient to accommodate the connection of the proposed new power sources. The ‘Thermal Boundary Export Limit’ – the physical maximum energy capacity the system can accommodate during planned system faults – would be exceeded, preventing export of power to demand centres beyond East Anglia.
“In these circumstances, generators connecting in the area would be required to reduce their output and would be compensated via a ‘constraint’ payment. These costs would be passed on to end consumers.”
More from East Anglia Bylines
