Electricity has started flowing through a deep-level tube train sized tunnel running through South London.
The first of two new circuits that connect National Grid’s New Cross substation in Southwark with its Hurst substation in Bexley is now live, running for 18km beneath South London through tunnels up to 50 metres deep.
This new link replaces one of two buried cables that have served the capital since the 1960s, with the other to be replaced when the second New Cross-Hurst circuit goes live in the new year.
While the old cables were buried in shallower trenches in the streets, the LPT2 network carries power in three metre wide tunnels deep beneath the road network.
In total, the £1 billion London Power Tunnels 2 (LPT2) project, which began in 2019, spans 32.5km across seven South London boroughs from Wimbledon to Hurst.
Construction of the tunnels began in March 2020, and tunnelling was carried out in three sections between existing National Grid substations:
- Wimbledon-New Cross (12km)
- New Cross-Hurst (18km)
- Hurst-Crayford (2.5km)
The current London Power Tunnels project through South London follows the completion in 2018 of the first phase – a seven-year, £1 billion project to construct 32km of tunnels and two new substations to rewire the network in North London.