National Grid Reportedly Buys 70+ Acres for Teesside Data Centre Substation

National Grid Electricity Transmission has signed a deal to buy more than 70 acres at Dorman Point on the Teesworks site in Teesside, England, for a substation to serve a neighbouring data centre, Sky News reported on Nov. 1, citing unnamed sources.

Sources told Sky the data centre is likely to be the largest in Europe. The report said the site has drawn interest from US-based frontier AI labs and hyperscalers, and a tech industry source expects an investment decision with a preferred partner within months. No operator or tenant has been named, and neither National Grid nor Teesworks has put a capacity or a date on the data centre itself.

On the record, Matt Pearce, National Grid's head of lands, called the land agreement "an important step forward in the development of the new substation" and said it is part of the company's Great Grid Upgrade programme. Chris Musgrave, chairman of Teesworks, said the focus now is remediation works and preparing the land for handover.

Tees Valley Mayor Ben Houchen said in a statement to Sky News that the biggest problem for anyone building a data centre in Britain is getting enough power to the site quickly, and that having up to 3.2 GW of capacity on Teesside means the area can compete for those projects. Neither he nor the report tied that figure to the substation, the data centre or the wider estate, so it is a headline number rather than a confirmed connection size.

Why the substation is the story

For a data-centre developer in Britain, the wait for a grid connection is often longer than the build. Securing land for a National Grid substation next to the site, before an operator is signed, moves the hardest piece of the schedule forward. The Sky report adds that Balfour Beatty is reportedly set to build the substation, which would put a listed contractor on a transmission-grade connection for a single campus.

The 2,500-acre Teesworks estate also has its own power network. Steel River Power runs the private electricity network there, and Sky described it as a joint venture between Steel River Energy and North West Electricity Networks, which is part of Iberdrola, the owner of ScottishPower. A National Grid substation would connect that private network to the transmission system.

What the public record shows

The project predates the land deal. Board papers of the South Tees Development Corporation for its March 30, 2026 meeting describe a "Node A" super substation at Dorman Point, with plans progressing with National Grid in collaboration with Steel River Power. After National Grid finished its development fit analysis, the papers say, Dorman Point was confirmed as the preferred location, and agreements between Teesworks Ltd, Steel River Power and National Grid could allow further remediation to start once final arrangements are confirmed. The same papers put remediation at Dorman Point at about 60% complete.

That matters for timing: the land has to be cleaned and handed over before a substation can be built on it. Separately, the corporation's papers record reserved matters approval, granted by Redcar and Cleveland Borough Council on Aug. 1, 2025, for roughly 5.5 million sq ft of data-centre development at a different plot, The Foundry. Neither the papers nor the Sky report links that approval to the Dorman Point substation.

The deal also fits the policy push on grid access. The government's British Data Centre Covenant offers priority connections to operators that meet local investment conditions, as Voltgrid reported. National Grid has other large works in the pipeline, including the Sea Link reinforcement between Suffolk and Kent, which won development consent on Oct. 30.

What is not confirmed yet

The purchase, the contractor and the data centre's scale rest on Sky's unnamed sources, apart from the on-record comments from Pearce, Musgrave and Houchen. National Grid has not published the price or the substation's connection capacity. The buyer or buyers of the data centre, the planning route for the substation and the energisation date are all open, as is whether the 3.2 GW figure describes the substation, the data centre or the estate.