Overhead cables (moving/burying)

[bgmill]

I'm in the process of purchasing two adjoining plots. Plot A has a dwelling on it that we're going to be knocking down to make way for a new build; plot B wraps plot A and is currently agricultural land that will eventually become an extended garden.

 

There are two wooden electricity poles that sit entirely on plot B, but the cables themselves span diagonally over plot A. Due to cable sag, they actually sit within about 3.5 metres of the roof of the property (specifically over a small single story side extension built ~10 years ago) which appears to be a lot closer than should be permitted. This is directly in the way of where we want the new (much taller) property to sit.

 

I've been in comms with UK Power Networks to get the cables buried along the boundary instead, and this is where things start to get a bit hairy:

 

• They've quoted £27,000 + VAT for the works.
• The is with me doing all groundwork in preparation - they want another £8,000 + VAT to do it all.
• Total distance of buried cable would be ~120 metres.

 

UKPN has confirmed that there's a Wayleave in place but strangely cannot seem to find a copy on their systems anywhere and therefore cannot tell me what the terms are (or even if it's voluntary). The sellers also cannot find a copy of the Wayleave so we're at a bit of a stalemate until it materialises.

 

What's my next move here? the quote seems totally excessive to me but I assume UKPN can charge whatever they want as there are no alternatives?

 

Thanks.

[Jeremy Harris]

Welcome.

 

Do you know if the cables are LV or HV?  Makes a fairly big difference to the cost of the work if it's an HV cable.

 

Also, a wayleave would not automatically be binding on you, as the new owner, as often they terminate upon sale.  A wayleave normally has a small annual payment to the landowner,  and will give a termination notice period.  An easement would normally be registered with the Land Registry and would bind you as the new owner to allow the cables to cross the land.  Worth paying the small Land Registry fee to see if there's an easement lodged with the title.

 

We had both an underground cable crossing our plot and an overhead cable, both LV and niether having an easement or wayleave in place.  I negotiated a price to have the cables moved to a new underground location around the edge of the plot, and agreed to pay about half of the sum that the DNO would normally charge, as roughly half the work was for our convenience.  I also agreed to an easement, so now the DNO have the permanent right to run the cables around the edge of our land, and have a pole in one corner.

 

Assuming it's a relatively light duty LV overhead it's replacing, something like 95mm² ABC, then as an indicator as to price 120m of wavecon 95 underground cable would cost about £3k.  You may be able to lay the cable; our DNO were happy to just drop off a drum and have our guys lay it.  The only other cost is then the removal of the poles and the cost of jointing.  Jointing would be two people for maybe half a day for making off two connections.  There would be a cost for the legal stuff, probably two or three hundred on top of that.  I'd have thought that a straightforward LV underground replacement cable installation, with the removal of a couple of poles and just a joint at either end, should be somewhere around £8k to £10k.  The devil's in the detail, though, as if it's a heftier cable, or if it's HV, then the costs will be higher.

[ProDave]

That sounds expensive.

 

Near here a self builder paid £11K to have well over 100 metres of 11KV 3 phase undergrounded and including the provision of the supply for his new house, which meant hanging a transformer on  one of the poles.

[bgmill]

@JSHarris I believe it's HV, is there any way to tell just from the visual appearance?

 

I think I might need to just wait until the Wayleave terms surface so i can see if I can serve notice or not. There's nothing on the title for plot A (the house) but I can't find the adjacent plot on Land Registry as I don't think it's ever been sold before.

[ProDave]

Post a picture.

 

HV will be 2 or 3 separate wires standing up in insulators and well spaced out usually supported on a horizontal steel angle.  LV will be a single (multicore) wire or individual wires just standing off the pole on insulators one above the other.

[Jeremy Harris]

This is what a typical rural HV overhead will look like:

 

 

[bgmill]

Yep, it's HV then.

[Jeremy Harris]

HV puts the price up a bit compared to LV, really just because the cable is more expensive and the joints take a bit longer to make, but it shouldn't be a huge increase.  There are also restrictions on HV with regard to the distance from structures.  Off the top of my head I think the minimum clearance between an 11kv cable and a building is 3.7m (need to check this, as my memory may not be 100%).  If the cables are closer to the building than this then it may be that they need to be moved anyway, so there may be some possible way to use that when negotiating the price with UKPN.

[bgmill]

@JSHarris @ProDave thanks for you help. Once I have the Wayleave terms I can start some negotiations with UKPN - I had also read that the clearance had to be 3.7m and I'm pretty certain the cables are already within this so, as you say, that might be a good starting point for discussions.

[Jeremy Harris]

@bgmill, good luck, please keep us posted on the outcome, as it's always useful to have examples of the cost of this stuff.  Prices seem to vary a lot (I sometimes suspect the DNOs make the numbers up!), and it helps others if we have some sort of baseline as to what the true costs might be.

[ProDave]

We were told you should not build withing 10 metres of an HV line. However drilling down into the detail found the limit was in fact 6 metres, but if building between 6 metres and 10 metres you need to take account of the line wrt cranes, scaffolding etc. 

[Ed Davies]

3 hours ago, bgmill said:

… I had also read that the clearance had to be 3.7m and I'm pretty certain the cables are already within this …

 

Don't use a metal tape measure when you check. ?

[ProDave]

8 minutes ago, Ed Davies said:

 

Don't use a metal tape measure when you check. ?

+11,000

[bgmill]

A little update on this:

 

The Wayleave was eventually found a couple of days before we exchanged which stated a 6-month termination period from either party. After a quick visit from a nice chap at UKPN, they've agreed to underground the cables entirely at their own cost along the boundary in exchange for an easement - which is fair enough - so a good outcome all told.

[scottishjohn]

17ft was what the dno told me was safety distance for a 110kplyon line

[bgmill]

The saga continues...

 

We're now around 10-11 months into the process and believed we were almost at the finish line however a final issue is now threatening to derail things entirely. To recap:

 

- we own a double plot with plot A containing an old bungalow and plot B wrapping it on two sides (see attached, red plot = A and blue plot = B)

- we have an HV overhead line essentially crossing at the middle boundary with an off-shoot that cuts through plot A diagonally (marked green). Neither line supplies our property or any of our neighbours.

- the main east-west HV route is entirely over-sailing, with a pole on our immediate neighbours land and the other about 100m away from our boundary in the farm field.

- the off-shoot has two poles, both on our land, one at the NE corner and another at the SW corner. This is the one we want removed/buried as it cuts through where we want to build our new house. There's an existing wayleave between UKPN and the previous owners with a 6mo termination clause.

- original quote was in excess of £30k to underground the route along the orange marked line but we finally had the DNO agree to cover all costs in exchange for easements for both the over-sailing line and the new underground route; all good and we agreed to this to avoid serving notice and risking them applying for a compulsory wayleave.

- fast forward a few months and we finally got the Heads of Terms through. Unfortunately the proposed terms would allow them to "erect, supplement and maintain" new overheads, inc. supports along the easements if they so wish in the future. Not an option for me and clearly defeats the purpose of what we're trying to achieve.

- I was told "no negotiation" initially but eventually managed to get them to agree to remove the clauses after 3-4 weeks of emails back-and-forth - result!

- next stage, Deeds of Easement were finally shared however a brand new clause had appeared disallowing me to lay any cable, conduit or pipe "across, under or above" the area marked in orange. Arghh!

 

 

So this is where we currently find ourselves. As the easement completely separates plot A from plot B it means one of my major build requirements -  ground-based solar PV in the NW corner of plot B - would no longer be viable as there would be no way to connect it up to the main house. It also precludes all sort of other things we or a future owner might want to do further down the line and would inherently devalue the land IMO.

 

I've asked if they can allow some kind of crossing area, clearly marked above ground with signage and at whatever max depth they tell me but I'm curious if crossing underground HV is an absolute no-go and I'm just fighting a losing battle here? The alternative would be going all the way around the outside of plot B, however that comes with it's own issues such as not being able to put any sheds or other structures against the boundaries for example, so again not an ideal scenario!

[ProDave]

Two things strike me.

 

Why does the branch have to come from the same place?  Would it be possible to take the branch from where the crossing line passes your left boundary.  That WOULD mean an extra pole at that point, but that would  avoid the orange cable passing under your land across the plot and remove the issue, so would that be a price worth paying?

 

The other, is if all you want to bury is a cable for the solar PV, just do it.  the 11KV cable will be a lot deeper than you need to go for an LV cable, just hand dig that part to be sure.

[Temp]

They are concerned that you might damage their cable. If they really won't budge ask if you can add..

 

"..without their permission, which will not be unreasonably withheld".

 

The alternative is to make sure you are there when they bury the cable so you know _exactly_ how deep it is and just get on with it.  I very carefully dug a pad foundation for the oak post of an outbuilding right over an 11kv line. 

Edited June 1, 2020 by Temp

[Temp]

PS I suspect if you welcome the engineers on site with tea and biscuits when they come to lay the cable they might even drop in a length of conduit across their trench at the right depth for you to use later.

[ProDave]

Or a further alternative.  Get them to agree to you burying a length of cable ducting up your plot passing over the buried 11KV cable at the rime the 11KV cable is installed,  through which you will later pull any cables you want with no need for excavation at that point.

[bgmill]

On 01/06/2020 at 20:20, Temp said:

They are concerned that you might damage their cable. If they really won't budge ask if you can add..

 

"..without their permission, which will not be unreasonably withheld".

 

 

 

This is the route I went in the end and am waiting to hear back from their solicitors (who have indicated they've agreed to similar terms previously).

 

I'll report back if/when we get it resolved!

[Temp]

 

I would also make sure you have some black duct and 3/8" polyprop draw rope ready for when the engineers come to lay the cable. Just ask them if there is any chance they can lay short lengths across their trench when they backfill to make it safer for you later.  

 

 

Edited June 11, 2020 by Temp

[Bozza]

SSE charged me £2k to remove one pole and overhead cable, to have my supply terminate in a site box at the bottom of another existing  pole that I didn’t need moving from end of my site.  And to add a stay to that remaining pole.  I did the trenching from pole to site box.  
 

SSE didn’t charge me VAT as was part of project groundworks etc.  After their engineers left I chainsawed down the redundant pole and they refunded me £1300 as they didn’t need to remove said pole.

 

So to remove overhead line and pole cost me £700.   Should say that pole & supply terminated at my site I was at the end of the run so to speak.  They needed digger and operator to dig down to insert stay line, and a couple of engineers for maybes half a days work.  
 

If you can do the trenching and pole removal yourself just leaving the DNO to do the actual engineering stuff you’ll get your quote way down.  
 

SSE were superb to deal with

 

(My reply just in case anyone trying to assess / research line removal costs or issues)

 

 

Edited June 12, 2020 by Bozza

[bgmill]

For anyone interested in how this panned out...

 

After ~15 months we've finally agreed the finer points and have last week signed Deeds of Easement awaiting registration with Land Registry. It has been a very painful experience and one I didn't expect to drag out for so long, but the good news is that we held firm and got what we wanted in the end - albeit at a financial cost (my legal fees clocked in at around £5k + VAT).

 

The only thing I couldn't get a contractual answer for was a date to implement the under-grounding works (the DNO cited Covid as the primary reason) but I think if push comes to shove I can now serve notice on the Wayleave which should at least force some action within 6 months or so.

 

We can now breathe a sigh of relief and get on with the good stuff, engaging with an architect and getting our build off (in?) the ground!

[jack]

What a saga - great to hear it paid off in the end, and well done for sticking to your guns.