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13 March
Utility Week Deputy Editor Rob Horgan rounds up the biggest stories of the week, with political indecision holding up reforms to both energy and water.
An increasing lack of political pace is beginning to dampen momentum behind proposed reforms in both energy and water.
The government is dragging its heels on several key decisions for the utility sector, be it the absence of a plan for reformed national pricing or the glacial pace at which water sector reforms are moving.
On the former, filling the void of the government’s much delayed action plan, energy companies and analysts have begun sharing their own thoughts. Last week, director for regulation and economic at Octopus Energy, Rachel Fletcher, said the government will not be able to make a significant dent in constraint costs without upsetting some renewable generators. While, LCP Delta has this week put out its own analysis which suggests that five key actions could cut constraint costs by more than two-fifths over the next decade.
A lack of action on shoring up the country’s gas supplies has also been front and centre to the national debate this week, as the Middle Eastern conflict continues to disrupt energy markets. It is the focus of our latest weekly edition, which laments a lack of action since the 2022 energy crisis and looks at what could be done to bolster supplies in the future.
The growing demand connection conundrum is one area that the government, and the sector’s regulators, cannot afford to waste any time on. DESNZ has followed Ofgem’s lead and both bodies are now consulting on potential reforms, with the government this week suggesting that data centres could be granted fast-track status and allowed to skip to the front of the queue alongside other projects deemed of ‘strategic importance’. Putting its own thoughts forward on the issue, the INA has suggested that a national connections dashboard is needed to help tackle bottlenecks on the grid.
On the water side of the utilities coin, the five appellant water companies finally have their confirmed pots of money to spend over the next five years after the CMA issued its final determinations of their business plans.
However, progress on implementing reforms in the water sector continues to take longer than many wanted, with Defra this week admitting that it has no end date in sight to wind-up operator self-monitoring (OSM), which gives water companies responsibility for reporting their own sewage spills.
The government’s refreshed infrastructure pipeline, published this week, again highlights the need for quick decision making. Produced by the National Infrastructure and Service Transformation Authority’s (NISTA), the second iteration of the 10-year delivery pipeline is valued at an eye-watering £718 billion and comprises 734 planned projects across energy, transport, health and water.
To deliver the projects, NISTA estimates that the UK will require an annual average workforce of between 621,000 and 697,000 over the next two years and between 629,000 and 706,000 over the next five years.
While the impending skills gap has long been forewarned, there are at last signs to be optimistic. Work is underway across government and the construction industry and wider built environment to secure a strong and sustainable pipeline of skilled workers. This includes the £625 million Construction Skills Package announced at Spring Budget last year, alongside the work of the Construction Skills Mission Board. The government has also promised to publish a Construction Jobs Plan and review of the Temporary Shortage List in the coming months.
Delivering Clean Power by 2030 and improving the performance of water companies will largely depend on the government being decisive on these promised plans.
Reforms to both water and energy will be a key theme across the conference programme at Utility Week Live in May.
5 March
Utility Week deputy editor Rob Horgan rounds up the week's biggest news, as the energy market responds to the conflict in Iran.
The conflict in Iran has set alarm bells ringing across the energy sector in the past week; be it rising gas prices or analysts forecasting a dramatic hike in the price cap this summer.
Retailers have already begun taking action to protect themselves from any imminent price shocks. Data shared with Utility Week shows that more than half of all fixed-rate tariffs have been swiftly taken off the market in the past week, while Octopus has also been forced to reintroduce exit fees for new customers on fixed deals.
There is one silver lining emerging from the uncertainty, however. With prolonged disruption to global gas supplies anticipated by many, the government’s decision to procure a record amount of renewable capacity in the latest round of Contracts for Difference auction looks like it is already paying off. Adam Bell, director of policy at Stonehaven, said a prolonged increase in gas prices could also make it more expensive to buy further capacity in future auctions, adding that the AR7 results are already looking like an “excellent bet”.
Alarm bells will have also been ringing elsewhere in the energy sector this week for a variety of reasons. Ofgem has been hit with the news that workers are due to vote again on further strike action as its drawn-out pay battle rumbles on. And the regulator was also informed this week that the country’s four gas distribution networks will be asking the CMA to redetermine their RIIO3 final determinations.
In water, the sector’s regulators and those it regulates have once again been locking horns; with South West Water pleading guilty to supplying water unfit for human consumption and South East Water hit with a £22 million fine for supply interruptions. The latter announced despite South East’s failed attempts to secure an injunction to prevent Ofwat revealing its decision.
The water sector’s trade body has also this week warned that new rules due to be introduced by Ofwat risk undermining the country housebuilding and AI growth ambitions – no doubt setting off an unthinkable number of alarm bells on Whitehall.
The political and regulatory landscape both in water and energy will be key themes at Utility Week Live in May.
27 February
Utility Week deputy editor Rob Horgan rounds up the week's biggest news, with Engie’s £10.5 billion takeover of UKPN stealing the headlines.
The big news in UK utilities during the past week is undoubtedly Engie’s acquisition of UK Power Networks (UKPN).
The deal – which was kept a heavily guarded secret right up until announcement – puts the enterprise value of UKPN at £15.8 billion, based on 1.5x the company’s estimated regulated asset value of £10.5 billion by March 2028. Engie said it would finance the acquisition through €4 billion of asset sales, €4 billion new debt and raise an extra €3 billion of new capital.
The French company’s chief executive Catherine MacGregor said the “virtuous” regulatory landscape in the UK played a significant role in the company’s decision to acquire UKPN, adding that she wished more regulators around the world were like Ofgem.
It is the latest in recent DNO takeover deals, following Iberdrola’s acquisition of Electricity North West last year and National Grid’s deal for Western Power Distribution in 2021. Given MacGregor’s high praise for the UK market, it begs the question of whether any more deals will be struck in this space in the near future.
Elsewhere, it has been another busy week in the energy retail market with Ofgem unveiling the new price cap for April. As well as confirming bill cost reductions announced in the Budget, the price cap announcement also came with the revelation that four energy retailers will begin offering low standing charge tariffs as part of a pilot programme.
Ofgem has this week also published its proposed KPI refresh, alongside which it expressed an interest for new entrants in the energy retail market with innovative business plans.
Responses to the government’s gas security of supply consultation have also started to trickle out, with National Gas calling for a new standard and the Future Energy Network warning that a “misleading narrative” around decommissioning will exacerbate the skills shortage.
The future of regulation, energy networks, and the retail sector will be hot topics at Utility Week Live in May. Click here, to register for your free place today.
20 February
Utility Week’s Editor-in-Chief James Wallin examines the latest developments in connections reform, and the looming challenges on the demand side. Plus, should we be concerned about the slow pace of reservoir construction?
A few weeks back, the energy minister warned we are becoming “obsessed” with reforms to the grid connections process. Michael Shanks might have a point and he may well have arrived at that view after reading Utility Week! However, I think our continued coverage of this important issue is entirely justified. Yes, we need to continue to build out the grid and ensure that renewable generation capacity continues to ramp up (both topics we have our own obsessions with) but achievements on either side count for little if we cannot bring them together.
So, there was some relief at the announcement this week that the National Energy System Operator (NESO) had started issuing offers to transmission and large embedded projects with protected connections dates in 2026 and 2027.
The process of reforming the connections queue may not have run particularly smoothly to date but it is encouraging to see progress. There will also hopefully be lessons to learn from the arguably even bigger challenge of managing demand connections. This work is in its infancy but as is pointed out in our story this week, there is little time to waste, given the increasing importance of data centres to our everyday lives and the growth of UK plc.
It is not just energy considerations that could stymie the growth of data centres, given their huge consumption of water. This gives added weight to the calls for new supplies of water, including building the UK’s first reservoirs in 40 years. But are we building this new infrastructure quick enough, and are their lessons that can be learnt from other countries?
These challenges of managing new sources of energy demand and building out water supply capacity will be at the heart of debates at Utility Week Live on 19-20 May. Click here, to register for your free place today.
12 February
Utility Week deputy editor Rob Horgan rounds up the week's biggest news, as the government announces a record-breaking haul in its latest CfD auctions, and the connections process hits another stumbling block.
Depending on which way you spin it, it’s either been a great week for the push towards clean power, or a terrible one.
The truth is that it’s probably both.
There’s no doubt that the final results of the latest Contracts for Difference (CfD) auctions keep clean power on track and exceed even the most optimistic of predictions. AR7 has seen a record amount of solar, onshore wind and tidal generation backed. Combined with last month’s offshore wind results, it means that AR7 is the biggest ever auction round, with a total of 14.7GW procured from 201 projects. This beats the previous record set by AR4, which secured 10.8GW in 2022.
However, analysis carried out for Utility Week by consultancy LCP Delta, shows significant remaining shortfalls in the amount of solar and wind generation required to reach the ranges that the National Energy System Operator (NESO) has calculated will be required in order to deliver clean power by 2030. That said, there is no doubt that AR7 is a success story for clean power advocates to shout about.
A bigger dent to the clean power push, however, remains problems with the connections process. Following last month’s announcement that NESO is set to revise its connection offer timeline after missing its self-imposed January deadline, it was revealed this week that two-thirds of the projects most needed to achieve clean power are expected to have their connection dates revised. Of the 340 transmission projects that qualified for protected connection dates in 2026 and 2027, 210 are expected to have their offers changed. In response, Ofgem said it is “both frustrated and disappointed” over the inability for transmission owners and NESO to stick to the existing offers for projects.
The regulator has also this week expressed concerns over NESO’s ability to demonstrate value for money and has demanded that the body now submit monthly costings to Ofgem. NESO will be required to provide monthly monitoring of its latest forecast spend, actual spend and headcount to Ofgem. This includes NESO’s total cost of delivering each of its core roles: energy markets, strategic energy planning, energy insights, security of supply modelling, energy systems resilience, systems operations, network operability, connections and facilitating sector digitisation.
Overcoming challenges with the connections process and achieving Clean Power by 2030 will be two common talking points throughout the two-day conference programme at Utility Week Live in May. Click here, to register for your free place today.
6 February 2026
Utility Week deputy editor Rob Horgan rounds up the week's biggest news, with calls for reform dominating the headlines in both water and energy.
It’s been a week dominated by calls for reform across the utilities sector (that’s reform with a small ‘r’, predominantly).
The biggest call for change – and perhaps the most surprising – came in the form of the Welsh Government’s green paper, responding to the Independent Water Commission’s (IWC’s) root and branch review of the water sector. Its contents certainly raised more than a few eyebrows, with the administration not afraid to push back against recommendations made by Sir Jon Cunliffe and his commissioners.
The headline news was that the Welsh Government has no intention of creating a ‘single’ water regulator for the country, as the IWC had proposed. The green paper also casts doubt on the IWC’s proposal to streamline nine planning documents into two overarching publications; raises serious concerns with the IWC’s recommendation for compulsory smart metering; and sets out an alternative approach to system planning.
The spotlight has also centred firmly on reforms in the energy sector during the past week. Our Digital Weekly edition leads on Ofgem’s new rules for heat networks, examining whether the raft of requirements are enforceable. And it looks at possible changes the incoming flexibility commissioner could make to the Clean Flexibility Roadmap.
There have also been calls for changes to the smart meter rollout and agitations for the boiler upgrade scheme to undergo an overhaul. Meanwhile it’s a case of back to the future in the energy retail market with regulation bosses at both Octopus and So Energy calling on Ofgem to revert to its old ways when it comes to tracking competition in the market.
Reform, both with a little and a big R, will be a common theme running across Utility Week Live’s seven content stages in May, with the upstart party’s deputy leader and energy spokesperson Richard Tice lined up for a grilling on the keynote stage.
29 January 2026
Utility Week deputy editor Rob Horgan rounds up the week's biggest news, as industry figures begin to poke holes in both the water white paper and the Warm Homes Plan and the energy sector readies itself for government’s review of Ofgem.
As the old adage goes, ‘after the Lord Mayor’s show comes the dust cart’. The utilities sector has felt a bit like that this week, following the double-serving of major announcements in the form of the Warm Homes Plan and the water white paper which arrived the week before.
With the dust settling on both announcements, the initial dose of excitement has been tempered by an equal measure of disappointment by industry representatives. The focus this week switching from what has been committed to, to what is missing from both plans.
On the warm homes front, there is a growing angst that the government has snubbed hybrid heat pumps as a possible solution to its electrification ambitions. Many commentators have pointed to the success of the Dutch electrification rollout, which has been boosted by support for hybrids, as model which should have been replicated.
Meanwhile, scant detail in the water white paper beyond headline announcements has thrown up a series of unanswered questions: When will anything get done? Why don’t we have a shadow regulator yet? And who is in charge of PR29? To cite just three.
Another area of the white paper which has been questioned is around the government’s proposal to introduce so-called ‘MOT-style checks’ on water company assets. Anglian Water’s head of strategic asset planning Geoff Darch derided the government’s much-hyped plans – and instead demanded more investment – during an appearance in front of the House of Lords Environment and Climate Change Committee this week.
While the fallout from both plans continues, attentions are also starting to turn to announcements yet to come. Primarily, the government’s review of Ofgem, publication of which is almost a year late. Two former regulators gave their thoughts on what the review – which we understand is imminent – could mean for the future of energy regulation.
Also looking to the future, there have been several forward-looking announcements made in the past seven days including Ofgem opening its AI sandbox; Elexon appointing its Flexibility advisory board; and DESNZ confirming the extension of the Warm Home Discount until the end of the decade.
The future of both water and energy regulation will be key pillars running through the content at Utility Week Live in May. Register for your place today by clicking here.
23 January 2026
Utility Week's Deputy Editor Rob Horgan rounds up last week's biggest news, including the publication of the eagerly-awaited water white paper and the Warm Homes Plan.
You wait months for a major government announcement and then two whoppers land on consecutive days. In years gone by you’d compare them to London buses, but I’m informed that they’re more reliable these days.
The first eagerly-awaited announcement to finally see the light of day this week was the water white paper. Now titled The New Vision for Water, the paper sets out the government’s response to the Independent Water Commission’s root and branch review of the sector. It includes the proposal which, if pushed through, could force all water companies to draw up individual contingency plans setting out how their networks would continue to operate in the event of special administration.
The paper also reveals a shake up to the price control process for PR29; signals the government’s intention to appoint a chair-designate for the new ‘super’ regulator; and confirms there will be more leniency over performance penalties. That is in addition to announcements made on the eve of the report’s publication, which revealed the introduction of ‘no notice’ inspections; regular ‘MOT’-style checks on water infrastructure; and the incorporation of a chief engineer role within the industry’s new ‘super’ regulator.
The impact of the impending overhaul was also the focus of a Public Accounts Committee meeting this week, with interim Ofwat CEO Chris Walters admitting that uncertainty is leading to an exodus of staff at the regulator with more than 100 roles currently unfilled.
The other delayed publication to be put out this week was the government’s Warm Homes Plan. Originally slated for publication in October last year, the £15 billion plan to keep the UK’s population warm has largely been met with optimism, particularly by those with a vested interest in the solar and batteries. That is largely due to an increase in government targets with ambitions for a threefold increase in the number of homes with solar panels by 2030.
The plan was not so warmly welcomed by heat pump advocates however, with the government significantly watering down its ambition to rollout the low-carbon heating source. The plan confirms that the government has finally given up any hope of installing 600,000 heat pumps per annum by 2028. Instead, a new target of reaching 450,000 installations every year by 2030 has been set.
The plan also produced grumbles from the gas lobby, with no support outlined for hybrid heating; little ambition shown towards the role of biomethane; and an almost total blackout on the role hydrogen could play in heating homes.
The fallout from both papers will no doubt be a hot topic at Utility Week Live in May, with several sessions scheduled across the two-day event focussing on regulatory reform in water and home heating, as well as a sharp focus on the future of the gas sector.
To see all this content with your industry colleagues, register for your place today by clicking here.
Utility Week Editor-in-Chief James Wallin vlogs weekly from the frontline of the utilities industry
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