Brexit has raised fears for interconnector developers, says ElecLink chief executive Steven Moore, even though the need for interconnections has become, “if anything, more urgent”.

Moore said Brexit has “introduced a lot of political uncertainty into what was already a very complex market”. But In an exclusive interview with New Power he highlighted day to day trading issues that raised more immediate issues than longer term political risk. His fear is about the cost of the IT and the system and processes, and how that system can be built at a time when it is not clear how the GB market will trade with Europe. “In parallel with building the interconnector … we have to build the business environment that allows us to operate a fully functional and compliant interconnector business.  [That means] all the systems that allow us to connect to power exchanges, allow traders to trade capacity, make sure the power flows come through, to balances and settlement. That systems investment is another string to the business.”

His fear is rule changes and divergence between GB and Europe that change the systems being written. “If you have a new set of requirements, that has not been a great use of time and resources. We are investing a lot of our shareholders money in making sure that we are compliant with current licence conditions.” The fear over incurring big IT system costs goes for other interconnector projects, he believes. “There are a lot of potential investors that are looking at this business model at the moment and want some certainty before they will proceed.”