Scottish And Southern Energy Plc
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SSE plc (formerly Scottish and Southern Energy plc) is a multinational energy company headquartered in
Perth, Scotland Perth (Scottish English, locally: ; gd, Peairt ) is a city in central Scotland, on the banks of the River Tay. It is the administrative centre of Perth and Kinross council area and the historic county town of Perthshire. It had a population o ...
. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange, and is a constituent of the
FTSE 100 Index The Financial Times Stock Exchange 100 Index, also called the FTSE 100 Index, FTSE 100, FTSE, or, informally, the "Footsie" , is a share index of the 100 companies listed on the London Stock Exchange with (in principle) the highest market ...
. SSE operates in the United Kingdom and Ireland.


History


Origins

The company has its origins in two public sector electricity supply authorities. The former North of Scotland Hydro-Electric Board was founded in 1943 to design, construct and manage hydroelectricity projects in the Highlands of Scotland, and took over further generation and distribution responsibilities on the nationalisation of the electricity industry within the United Kingdom in 1948. The former
Southern Electricity Board Southern Electric plc was a public limited energy company in the United Kingdom between 1990 and 1998, when it merged with Scottish Hydro-Electric plc to form Scottish and Southern Energy plc (now SSE plc). The company had its origins in the so ...
was created in 1948 to distribute electricity in Southern England. Whilst the Southern Electricity Board was a distribution only authority, with no power generation capacity of its own, the North of Scotland Hydro-Electric board was a broader spectrum organisation, with its own generating capabilities. Because of its history and location, the Hydro-Electric Board was responsible for most of the hydroelectric generating capacity in the United Kingdom. Both authorities were privatised in 1990/91, initially retaining their pre privatisation geographic and functional bases. The North of Scotland Hydro-Electric Board became
Scottish Hydro-Electric Scottish Hydro plc was a public electricity supplier formed on 1 August 1989 after a change of name from North of Scotland Electricity plc on that date. It was listed on the London Stock Exchange and was once a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index ...
, whilst the Southern Electricity Board became Southern Electric.


Post privatisation

Scottish and Southern Energy was formed in September 1998, following a merger between Scottish Hydro-Electric and Southern Electric. In August 2000, Scottish and Southern Energy acquired the SWALEC energy supply business. SWALEC operate exclusively in Wales while SSE operates in Scotland and England. In July 2004, the company acquired the Ferrybridge and Fiddlers Ferry power stations for £250 million. In January 2008, it went on to buy Airtricity Holdings, an Irish wind farm business. In August 2009, it agreed to purchase Uskmouth power station from Welsh Power Group. In April 2010, the company purchased the natural gas exploration and production assets of Hess Corporation in three areas of the United Kingdom Continental Shelf – Everest/Lomond, Easington and Bacton. In January 2010, Scottish and Southern Energy changed the core company branding from Scottish and Southern Energy to SSE.


Separation of retail supply division

In November 2017, it was announced that SSE was looking to separate from its retail subsidiary which would then merge with the Npower division of rival
Innogy Innogy SE was an energy company based in Essen, Germany. It is now merged and integrated into German energy company E.ON. History The company was created on 1 April 2016, by splitting the renewable, network and retail businesses of RWE into a ...
. It was planned that SSE shareholders will own 65.6% of the
demerged A demerger is a form of corporate restructuring in which the entity's business operations are segregated into one or more components. It is the converse of a merger or acquisition. A demerger can take place through a spin-off by distributed or ...
entity and Innogy would hold the remainder. The resulting company would have been listed on the London Stock Exchange and included npower's residential and business retail business, and SSE's residential energy supply and home services business, excluding its business in Ireland. Although the merger received preliminary regulatory clearance from the Competition and Markets Authority on 30 August 2018, and full clearance was given on 10 October 2018, it was abandoned on 17 December 2018, with the companies blaming "very challenging market conditions". In September 2019, SSE announced that it would be selling its retail business to OVO Energy: the transaction was completed in January 2020.


Swiss holding company

In November 2019, SSE moved its UK business into a new Swiss holding company, confirming that it had done so following the Labour Party's pledge to take it into state ownership. It said the move was: The Labour Party said:


Other divestments

In August 2021, SSE agreed to sell its 33.3% stake in gas distribution company SGN for £1.2 billion.


Operations

SSE Thermal operates a series of UK power stations, while
SSE Renewables SSE Renewables is a renewable energy subsidiary of SSE plc, which develops and operates onshore and offshore wind farms and hydroelectric generation in the United Kingdom and Ireland. History In October 2009, SSE announced that Airtricity woul ...
builds and operates onshore and offshore wind farms in the United Kingdom and Ireland, and has
hydroelectric Hydroelectricity, or hydroelectric power, is electricity generated from hydropower (water power). Hydropower supplies one sixth of the world's electricity, almost 4500 TWh in 2020, which is more than all other renewable sources combined and ...
operations in Scotland. Jointly owned with American waste management company Wheelabrator Technologies, Multifuel Energy Ltd operates multi-fuel power stations at Ferrybridge, West Yorkshire.


Initiatives


Living wage

SSE became the largest officially accredited Living Wage Employer in the United Kingdom in 2013. All its employees across the United Kingdom were guaranteed to receive the then-Living Wage rate of at least £7.85 an hour in 2013.


Fair Tax Mark

In October 2014, SSE became the first company on the FTSE 100 to be awarded the
Fair Tax Mark The Fair Tax Mark is an independent accreditation awarded by the Fair Tax Foundation after an assessment based on "Transparency ndtax rate, disclosure and avoidance"... As of January 2016, it is applicable to UK businesses. The process of assessi ...
which is an independent accreditation process for identifying companies making an effort to be transparent about their tax affairs.


Sponsorship

The company currently sponsors the SSE Arena in Belfast. It previously sponsored Wembley Arena in London and
The Hydro The OVO Hydro is a multi-purpose indoor arena located within the Scottish Event Campus in Glasgow, Scotland, and is the largest entertainment venue in Scotland. The arena was initially named The Hydro after its main sponsor Scottish Hydro El ...
in Glasgow, but the naming rights of these venues switched to OVO with the sale of its retail supply division.


Other

In February 2022, the company signed up to the UN's Women Empowerment Principles, an initiative to support women in the workplace which was founded by United Nations Global Compact and UN Women.


Regulator action

In April 2013, industry regulator Ofgem fined SSE £10.5 million for mis-selling gas and electricity. In September 2020, industry regulator Ofgem fined SSE £2.06 million for failing to publish information about the future availability of its generation capacity in a timely manner. SSE co-operated fully with Ofgem's investigation.


See also

*
Energy policy of Scotland Energy policy in Scotland is a matter that has been specifically reserved to the UK parliament under the terms of the Scotland Act 1998 that created the devolved Scottish Parliament. However, since planning is a matter that has been devolved, the S ...
* Electricity in Northern Ireland * Energy use and conservation in the United Kingdom * Green electricity in the United Kingdom * Peterhead Power Station


References


External links

*
Scottish and Southern Energy Networks
{{DEFAULTSORT:Scottish And Southern Energy 1998 establishments in Scotland Energy companies established in 1998 Companies listed on the London Stock Exchange Electric power distribution network operators in the United Kingdom Former nationalised industries of the United Kingdom Companies based in Perth, Scotland Electric power companies of Scotland Utilities of Scotland Wind power companies of Scotland