National Grid wires five London data centres while its delivery record takes the hits
Reported contracts would wire five London data centres and 1 GW of demand into the grid days after a trade report found National Grid significantly under-delivered boundary capacity in the T2 period. Ofgem is rewriting who pays to connect, and from London to Albany the money is being asked to wait.
Vincent Jiang · 3 min read
The London hook-up is being contracted
The AI power wave in London is turning into cable and concrete. Key construction contracts on National Grid's North West London Upgrade have gone to Laing O'Rourke and to a Hochtief-Murphy joint venture, with the JV installing high-voltage cable and upgrading tunnels 12. The reinforcement exists to connect five data centres with a combined 1 GW of demand 1. No contract value has been disclosed, and the awards rest on syndicated reports citing unnamed media rather than a company announcement 1.
The hook-up sits inside a near-£5bn build
Behind it sit the £600m substation civils framework National Grid signed with 31 suppliers this month 3 and the £4.3bn, 2 GW Eastern Green Link 2 between Scotland and England, due in 2029 1. Group capex ran to $13.2bn in the year to March 2026, up 16 percent, against revenue that slipped about 1 percent to $23.6bn 4. The spend is contracted. The earnings depend on delivery.
Capex jumped 16 percent in FY2026 while revenue slipped
- Revenue
- Capex
Data
| Revenue | Capex | |
|---|---|---|
| FY2025 | $23.9B | $11.4B |
| FY2026 | $23.6B | $13.2B |
The delivery record is being scored
On 2 October a trade report found National Grid "significantly under delivered" new boundary capacity in the T2 price-control period 5. Ofgem's assessment of the connections queue, run by the system operator the British state bought from National Grid in 2024, found the reform missed deadlines and sent developers inaccurate offers 6. The regulator is consulting on a refundable connection fee of £237,500 to £712,500 per megawatt for data-centre applicants, after queue demand jumped from 41 GW to 125 GW in seven months, at least 80 GW of it data centres 7. Who pays is being rewritten while the pipes are being laid.
America dangles its own money
The US side softens the picture. The Department of Energy picked National Grid's DREAM dynamic-rating project for about $49m under its SPARK programme, a four-year effort from next year and still subject to a final agreement, a size the company's own statement left out 18. Vice president of engineering Andrew Schneller pitched it as "getting more value from the infrastructure we already have" 8. In New York, the company proposes holding gas delivery rates steady to spring 2028 for nearly 2 million customers, while advocates warn the plan defers charges tied to more than $1.7bn of proposed pipe spending; regulators have no deadline to act 9.
Three dates will score the build-out
Bernstein resumed coverage on 15 September at outperform, 1,310 pence, and the shares sit 18 percent below their 52-week high 1. Watch three dates: distribution flexibility awards in January 2027, from a tender spanning more than 800 zones 1; Albany's ruling whenever it comes 9; and the next price control, which will score the build-out the AI queue is already funding. The hook-up is sold in megawatts and judged in delivery years.
Deepdive
AI-generated from this story and its cited sources. Not investment advice.
