Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks (SSEN) are seeking new contract partners to help deliver the construction, maintenance, dismantling, and renewal of overhead lines and poles up to and including 33kV on their Distribution Network in central southern England.

More than 7 million people live and work in SSEN's licence area in the region, and they connect 3.1 million homes and businesses to the grid.

The electricity supplier is investing heavily, to strengthen resilience and further boost capacity, and have already spent nearly £290m on the area's network in the current price control period.

Our near-25,000kms of low voltage, high voltage, and 33kV overhead lines are a crucial part of our network in central southern England, and these new framework agreements will bring forward a step-change in how we deliver these critical network projects.

SSEN need suppliers to meet the highest levels of professionalism, and safety performance, and to complete projects flawlessly. For their part, and to make for a truly collaborative approach, for the first time SSEN will offer guaranteed volumes of work as part of these framework agreements.

Eliane Algaard, SSEN Distribution's Director of Customer Operations for central southern England said: "The overhead lines in our region are at the heart of our network, especially in more rural communities. These ambitious plans for ongoing renewal, expansion, and maintenance will ensure our customers' supplies will become even more reliable. They also support the move towards net zero, by providing some additional capacity to connect more low carbon technologies in the years to come."

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James Flanagan, SSEN Distribution's Director of Procurement added: "We've long enjoyed productive, mutually beneficial relationships with trusted contract partners, as we've worked together to maintain and expand the overhead network. These new framework agreements will move this co-operation into a new era, and our customers will notice the benefit from it. We're now looking forward to hearing from potential contract partners when they fill out the pre-qualification questionnaire."

Next steps for potential contract partners

At this time, SSEN is approaching the market with a pre-qualification questionnaire for long-term framework agreements for the construction, maintenance and dismantlement of overhead lines and poles on networks up to and including 33kV.

• The Pre-Qualification Questionnaire documents (FW Construction - Distribution OHL Works South (up to 33kV) - Multi Site 0333) can be downloaded for free from sse.app.jaggaer.com/ - see Current Opportunities page sse.app.jaggaer.com/esop/guest/go/opportunity/detail?opportunityId=391

• Should you wish to participate in this PQQ, please email [email protected] and confirm your request to be invited to respond to the PQQ. Please advise if you are are/are not registered on Jaggaer.

• If your company is already registered on Jaggaer, please contact [email protected] by email to register interest, you will be added to the event and a confirmation email will be sent to you, confirming the usernames registered to your Jaggaer account.

• If your company is not already registered on Jaggaer, please contact [email protected] with the name of your company and contact email address. We will start the registration process for you, and you will receive an invitation by email to complete this. Once you have completed the registration, please let us know and we will activate your account, following which you will be able to access and complete the PQQ.

• You will then be added to the PQQ event within our Jaggaer procurement system which can be accessed through the link already provided.

• Any queries should be sent to the above email address unless you have been added to the Jaggaer event, in which case queries should be sent through the Jaggaer messaging system.

SSEN will subsequently issue an Invitation to Tender aiming for a contract award in the second half of 2025.