Published: August 19, 2021    Reading time: 5 minutes

With the largest, most diverse private wire electricity network in the UK, Wilton International is the ideal site for energy-intensive businesses requiring a large power supply and other specialised utilities, and strategies in place for Net Zero emissions energy generation.

Power – a headache for investing businesses

For high energy use businesses, finding a site with a suitable grid connection can be difficult, time consuming and expensive, according to commercial property specialists Lambert Smith Hampton.

“Industrial companies are struggling to find sites with large power supplies,” a company representative says. “It can take over a year for a supply to be installed and the capital outlay is significant”.

It’s no surprise, therefore, that Peak Resources, to name just one recent investor, chose the site over international competitors for their multi-million pound investment in a minerals refining facility. They highlighted Wilton’s ‘plug and play’ access to competitively priced power, utilities and site services as a key factor in their decision.¹

Sembcorp Energy UK, the site’s operator, has a solid reputation for responding quickly to both prospective and existing customers with power and utilities solutions. And because of the scale of the businesses already located at Wilton International, such as SABIC, Alpek and Huntsman, there’s a sustainable, critical mass of companies to share the costs of all on-site services.

Find out more: Download Wilton International’s Energy Data Sheet

The UK’s largest private wire electricity grid

The energy offer from Sembcorp Energy UK is straightforward. On-site businesses are connected via 11KV or 66KV cable to the UK’s largest private wire network. Power is currently generated by four on-site units utilising three different feedstocks - gas, biomass and domestic waste:

• A Combined cycle gas turbine heat and power plant generates 40-75MW (plus 70-140 tonnes per hour steam)
• A combined heat and power gas turbine plant generates 40MW (plus 80-160 tonnes per hour steam);
• A biomass plant generates 33MW (plus 10 tonnes per hour steam)
• A combined heat and power ‘energy from waste’ plant generates 15-40MW (plus 150-0 tonnes per hour steam).²

This represents a greater diversity of power generation capacity than any other private wire network in the UK, which in turn means unbeaten resilience. The site also exports to, and can import from, the National Grid, providing additional back-up and security of supply if required.

UK-leading decarbonisation strategies

The presence at Wilton International of both a biomass plant and an energy-from-waste plant demonstrates Sembcorp Energy UK’s commitment to low carbon power generation, and to working with businesses on site to reduce their carbon footprints. Together, these power units save 330,000 tonnes of carbon per annum compared with fossil fuel production methods, while the energy-from-waste plant utilises 440,000 tonnes of household and residual waste that would otherwise go to landfill.²

However, investing energy-intensive businesses are now seeking future-proofed sites with clear strategies for the supply of decarbonised energy, and Sembcorp Energy UK has made a firm commitment to supporting the UK’s transition to Net Zero. For both these reasons, the company recently announced the development of the UK’s first Net Zero emissions power plant on the site, utilising ground-breaking Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) technology to deliver a UK-leading decarbonisation strategy.

Flexible development site solutions

As a top tier COMAH site, Wilton International meets the strict health, safety and security needs of businesses, primarily in the chemicals sector, that operate under those regulations. However, for energy-intensive businesses without COMAH requirements, Wilton International also offers development plots outside the high security environment. These are ideal for facilities including data centres and advanced manufacturing plants - offering competitively priced, resilient energy supplies and high-speed, high-bandwidth data connections, while providing business-appropriate levels of site accessibility and security.

Find out more: Download Wilton International’s Energy Data Sheet

‘Plug & play’ means more than power

It’s not only Wilton International’s power provision that appeals to expanding or relocating industrial businesses. The site’s ‘plug and play’ offer covers a wide range of utilities and services, including solutions for complex facilities with bespoke requirements:

• Steam can be piped throughout Wilton International from the on-site power plants and additional package boilers (which generate a further 120 tonnes per hour of steam).
• Demineralised, raw and potable water are available at scale, with spare capacity for new site occupants. Sembcorp currently supply 3.1 million cubic meters of demineralised water, 15 million cubic meters of raw water and 2.7 million cubic meters of potable water to facilities on site.
• The on-site waste water & effluent treatment facility also has spare capacity, with further capacity available at Northumbria Water’s Bran Sands facility, adjacent to the site.
• Natural gas and compressed air can be supplied to all plots, and industrial gases (including oxygen, nitrogen, hydrogen and carbon dioxide) are piped directly to the site from the nearby BOC plant.
• The site has a high-speed, high-bandwidth fibre network with diverse routing and two third party suppliers, ensuring security of connection.²

As well as supplying on-site power, steam, gas, water and effluent management services, Sembcorp Energy UK has the infrastructure to transport feedstocks, gases and chemicals to and from the site via 120km of pipelines and service corridors. These connect Wilton International to portside terminals and industrial facilities in the wider Teesside cluster.

Specialists in power and utilities provision

For investing businesses requiring large power supplies and bespoke utilities, high costs, bureaucracy and delays are the norm – not to mention site owners and developers that simply don’t understand their needs.

But at Wilton International it’s different. Sembcorp Energy UK specialises in supplying world-scale power and utilities to the largest industrial users, so they’re ready to support new businesses investing at the site. What’s more, the company’s ambitious decarbonisation strategies will help investing businesses address the defining challenge of the next few years.That’s likely to mean fewer headaches for investors, and real commercial benefits including reduced project costs, risk and timeframes.

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