installing mains electricity into new build

[AquaHydroChem]

I am looking at some hard standing pieces of ground for rent and for sale that have no mains electric And for me to rent or buy the pieces of land I am going to need electric.

I have done some research online and found that for installing mains electric off the grid will be any where from £500- 5K- 50K, but with no clear guidance of what this will involve

I have had a look at google and have not been able to find any kind of price guide to fees and insulation cost

Can anyone please explain the process involved and the costs please

Thanks
AHC

 

[securespark]

When you say "off the grid", do you mean "off-grid" or "from the grid"?

 

[cjard]

To get wired up to the grid, you contact the distribution network operator for your area, fill in an application form and send them a map of where your land is. They look at their map of where their mains are and devise a method of conecting you to a suitable near one. They send you a quote that contains "contestible"(work you may do yourself such as digging a trench) and noncontestible (work they must do such as connecting your supply cable to the main) work. It is usually in the region of thousands of pounds, and it is predominantly distance that causes the price to rise, with supply size also a factor. After they have been and gone youre left wih a service head, and contact an energy company like eon, Scottish power etc, order a meter from them and they come and install it. Eon will certainly leave an isolator connected to the meter tails. You must then arrange for a qualified spark to fit you a consumer unit and some power outlets. If the meter co didn't install an isolator switch then you have to call them back to connect tails between meter and your consumer unit. This is a faff, so if your meter supplier doesn't fit isolators, get eon/supplier who does to do the install on their standard no lock in tariff, then switch a month later.

I ordered a 3 phase connection that went 10 metres on my own land only and it was about 3 grand I think. A quote for putting my other single phase build on came to 2.5ish, going 6 metres and digging up a private metalled road. No one here can tell you the cost of yours, you're going to have to ask..

 

[Lectrician]

To get wired up to the grid, you contact the distribution network operator for your area, fill in an application form and send them a map of where your land is. They look at their map of where their mains are and devise a method of conecting you to a suitable near one. They send you a quote that contains "contestible"(work you may do yourself such as digging a trench) and noncontestible (work they must do such as connecting your supply cable to the main) work. It is usually in the region of thousands of pounds, and it is predominantly distance that causes the price to rise, with supply size also a factor. After they have been and gone youre left wih a service head, and contact an energy company like eon, Scottish power etc, order a meter from them and they come and install it. Eon will certainly leave an isolator connected to the meter tails. You must then arrange for a qualified spark to fit you a consumer unit and some power outlets. If the meter co didn't install an isolator switch then you have to call them back to connect tails between meter and your consumer unit. This is a faff, so if your meter supplier doesn't fit isolators, get eon/supplier who does to do the install on their standard no lock in tariff, then switch a month later.

I ordered a 3 phase connection that went 10 metres on my own land only and it was about 3 grand I think. A quote for putting my other single phase build on came to 2.5ish, going 6 metres and digging up a private metalled road. No one here can tell you the cost of yours, you're going to have to ask..

Why would you get a meter installed before first getting an electrician to do their work, leaving tails presented at the metering position? That's the usual way.

 

[james_help]

To get wired up to the grid, you contact the distribution network operator for your area, fill in an application form and send them a map of where your land is. They look at their map of where their mains are and devise a method of conecting you to a suitable near one. They send you a quote that contains "contestible"(work you may do yourself such as digging a trench) and noncontestible (work they must do such as connecting your supply cable to the main) work. It is usually in the region of thousands of pounds, and it is predominantly distance that causes the price to rise, with supply size also a factor. After they have been and gone youre left wih a service head, and contact an energy company like eon, Scottish power etc, order a meter from them and they come and install it. Eon will certainly leave an isolator connected to the meter tails. You must then arrange for a qualified spark to fit you a consumer unit and some power outlets. If the meter co didn't install an isolator switch then you have to call them back to connect tails between meter and your consumer unit. This is a faff, so if your meter supplier doesn't fit isolators, get eon/supplier who does to do the install on their standard no lock in tariff, then switch a month later.

I ordered a 3 phase connection that went 10 metres on my own land only and it was about 3 grand I think. A quote for putting my other single phase build on came to 2.5ish, going 6 metres and digging up a private metalled road. No one here can tell you the cost of yours, you're going to have to ask..

A follow up on this, as a Quantity Surveyor one of my projects a church extension required additional power to the new build so the contractors got us a price of I think 60k, few months down the line we was told the grid could not have any more load and we would need to use the grid further away from the site etc etc... the price went from 60k to 160k the client was not happy.

You have a 3 month window from the quote to expiry, so if the price is right go for it. In a personal point of view I think I paid £1,500 for a single phase new supply but this was a while back.

Have a look at this:

http://www2.nationalgrid.com/UK/Our-company/Electricity/Distribution-Network-Operator-Companies/

 

[PBC_1966]

The costs can be huge, and there's really no way of telling until you get a price from the DNO.

In my former life a neighbor's son was looking at getting power to a piece of land on which he had a mobile home and worked a lumber business, rural but only a couple of miles out of town and with power at all the surrounding properties, including a farm on the opposite side of the road and a house near the back end of his lot, about 3 acres.

Plan 1 was to get power to the land right by the road, near to where the caravan was located. There was an existing 3-phase 11kV feed to a transformer a few hundred yards along the road for the farm, but "Too far for LV," said EDF, and wanted to run an 11kV feeder and have him donate the corner of his land for a pad-mount transformer. Due to local planning, the HV also needed to be run underground. The total quote came in at something over £50,000 (I forget the exact price now).

Plan 2 was to try and get a feed to the far end of his land from a transformer which fed the house behind and which, if I recall correctly, involved a run of only about 50 ft. EDF would have needed to uprate the transformer, and we would have installed a suitable enclosure for metering equipment just onto the land - And done all the trenching. That came in at somewhere between £9,000 and £10,000 as I recall, but there would then be the additional cost of getting power to the other end of the land which would have cost several thousand more. It also needed the permission of the other land owner, which couldn't be obtained.

And that was getting on for 10 years ago now.

He went with plan 3 - Solar, wind, and generator.

 

[bernardgreen]

Being flexible as to where the joint to the street cable is located can reduce the cost.

Connecting a new supply to my cottage was quoted as £3000 and then when the DNO surveyor visited the site he suggested moving the location of the joint to the street cable by about a metre as it would save "a few pennies".

J1 was under the tarmac of my vehicle access to the road, J2 was under the grass verge. The final DNO cost with the joint under the verge was £ 900

Under a vehicle route requires traffic management to be in place ( yes even for a vehicle access to a private property ) while under a grass verge requires only safety barriers and much lower costs of re-instatement of the surface. A friend with a mini digger dug the trench from M (meter) to J2 for the same cost as it would have been to J1

 

[AquaHydroChem]

To get wired up to the grid, you contact the distribution network operator for your area, fill in an application form and send them a map of where your land is.

How do you go about doing this?

They send you a quote that contains "contestible"(work you may do yourself such as digging a trench)

So say if the process involves connecting electricity across a field or if your neighbours have a building with electricity
What is the process involved and who is paying for it?

I have heard something about you having to dig a hole in the ground for an earth rod
Do you know anything about that?

 

[Taylortwocities]

To get wired up to the grid, you contact the distribution network operator for your area, fill in an application form and send them a map of where your land is.

How do you go about doing this?

Firstly find out who your DNO is! James already has posted link where you can find out who it is. And there are contact numbers to call. Just phone them and tell them what you want.

Have a look at this:

http://www2.nationalgrid.com/UK/Our-company/Electricity/Distribution-Network-Operator-Companies/

So say if the process involves connecting electricity across a field or if your neighbours have a building with electricity
What is the process involved and who is paying for it?

It may or may not be necessary. After you contact the DNO and ask for a supply, they will do a survey. This will reveal where the feed will come from. If it needs to go across somebody elses land, the DNO will tell you what you need to do. It may not be necessary, so don't worry about it. It may not happen.

I have heard something about you having to dig a hole in the ground for an earth rod
Do you know anything about that?

Certain supply types need an earth rod, but that is something that is needed as part of the internal wiring to the property.
Its a very tiny detail that can be provided by your electrician if it is necessary. Most new supplies these days do not require an earth rod.
Again, don't worry about this.

SO. Tomorrow.
Job 1 - find out who your DNO is
Job 2 - phone them up and ask them what you need to do to get the ball rolling.[/QUOTE][/QUOTE]

 

[ban-all-sheds]

who is paying for it?

I'm pretty sure that will be you, that will.

 

[AquaHydroChem]

So I am getting the message that there is no clear guidelines on how to work the cost out
The only people who know are the DNO
Yes there was a link posted above http://www2.nationalgrid.com/UK/Our-company/Electricity/Distribution-Network-Operator-Companies/
I just don't like the idea of phoning an 08 number and weighting in a queue for hrs and ending up talking to some !£$%&#@
I would just prefer to talk to the right person that is all

BTW the sites I have in question are just hard standing ground and I wish to fit about 2-3 porter cabins on them, so All I need is A set of mains plugs I can just run an extension lead from

 

[ban-all-sheds]

So I am getting the message that there is no clear guidelines on how to work the cost out

There's a very clear guideline. You ask the DNO, and they tell you what it will cost. How hard is that?

The only people who know are the DNO

Well done.

Yes there was a link posted above http://www2.nationalgrid.com/UK/Our-company/Electricity/Distribution-Network-Operator-Companies/
I just don't like the idea of phoning an 08 number and weighting in a queue for hrs and ending up talking to some !£$%&#@

Well, you could see if you can find a non-premium number on saynoto0870. Or you could do without electricity.

I would just prefer to talk to the right person that is all

That will be someone who works for the DNO, that will.

All I need is A set of mains plugs I can just run an extension lead from

No - you need a properly provided supply from the DNO, and metering by an electricity company with whom you have a contract, and an electrician to install all the stuff on your side in accordance with BS 7671.

 

[PBC_1966]

So I am getting the message that there is no clear guidelines on how to work the cost out
The only people who know are the DNO

That's it. You might be able to look at a new home on a developed street where you want your new meter box 50 ft. from existing lines and come to the conclusion that it will almost certainly be cheaper than getting power to your remote farmstead where there's not a single power line for a mile in any direction, but beyond that there are just too many variables, both in the amount of work involved and the price the DNO will charge for that work. Contacting them and getting a quote is the only way - They don't use any sort of simple distance formula or anything like that, if that's what you had in mind.

 

[ban-all-sheds]

I expect he thinks that having to ask the DNO is some fascist sales bullshit.

 

[Taylortwocities]

@AquaHydroChem If you fear telephone discussions, for a lot of DNOs, you can apply on line to get the ball rolling. Once you find out who your DNO is you can look on their website. My DNO is SSE and you can apply on line for up to 4 new connections.

CLICK HERE

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Do let us know how you get on.