Great British Energy: 12 months on

The Great British Energy Act received Royal Assent on 15 May 2025, meaning it formally becomes law.

The Act established GB Energy as a publicly-owned and operationally independent energy company.

The UK Government’s Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ) will publish a statement of strategic priorities for GB Energy in 2025. GB Energy will then develop and publish its strategic plan in response.

DESNZ will also publish a framework document for GB Energy in 2025 which will explain how the two organisations will work together.

This will give us more detail about GB Energy’s plans over the next few years.

Since the Great British Energy Bill was approved by Parliament, GB Energy has already had an impact in local communities.

In June 2025, 11 schools in England installed solar panels as part of GB Energy’s rooftop solar roll out. This is set to save those schools £175,000 a year. GB Energy is focusing on installing solar panels in schools in areas of high deprivation.

It has also announced a further £700 million of funding for clean energy supply chains. This means £1 billion of funding has been committed to help companies who’ll help deliver GB Energy’s plans.

GB Energy is also working with industry, public finance and investment groups to support offshore wind projects.

It’s also working with mayoral strategic authorities in England and has invested £10 million into supporting new clean power projects.

There will be five key functions to Great British Energy:

• Developing clean energy projects through its partnership with the Crown Estate.
• Investing in and owning renewable energy projects.
• Incentivising local power through the Local Power Plan.
• Help build clean energy supply chains in the UK.
• Work with Great British Nuclear to deliver new nuclear projects.

GB Energy won’t supply electricity directly to households. Instead, it will work with the private sector to co-invest in emerging energy technologies to make them competitive with more mature technologies, including:

• hydrogen that’s created from water (water electrolysis), also called green hydrogen
• floating offshore windfarms
• tidal power

The UK Government also intends to scale investment in existing mature technologies, such as:

• onshore wind
• solar power
• nuclear energy

It will also work with local authorities and community energy organisations to expand small and medium renewable energy projects, like:

• solar
• wind
• hydroelectricity

GB Energy as already established partnerships with devolved governments, mayoral authorities, The Crown Estate and the National Wealth Fund.

GB Energy is publicly-owned and operationally independent energy company, with an independent board. This board will set the strategy for how GB Energy will collaborate with industry and communities.

There is also an executive committee, led by CEO Dan McGrail. This committee set the direction of GB Energy alongside allocating resources and tracking performance.

Great British Energy will develop, own and operate the renewable energy assets. Specific projects will be owned by local councils and communities.

The company’s HQ is in Aberdeen, with plans to add sites in Glasgow and Edinburgh over time. While it’s Scotland-based, the whole of the UK should benefit.

GB Energy’s initial aims were to:

• Lower energy bills for every household by an average of £300 a year.
• Increase energy security by reducing the UK’s reliance on imported fossil fuels from countries like Norway, Qatar, the US and Russia.
• Take on the challenge of delivering green electricity by 2030, through increased use of renewable energy sources.
• Create thousands of new jobs in all parts of the UK through local energy generation.

The UK Government’s election manifesto emphasised working with local leaders and devolved governments to encourage ‘local power generation.’ The aim is to reduce the strain on the grid and ensure local people benefit directly from the energy their area produces.

Part of this plan involves supporting community energy groups with commercial, technical and project planning assistance. This is something we currently provide support in:

• Wales: Welsh Government Energy Service
• Scotland: Scottish Government’s Community and Renewable Energy Scheme (CARES)

The UK Government’s proposed Local Power Plan will see Great British Energy partner with local communities to develop renewable energy projects. This should generate up to eight gigawatts (GW) of energy through these projects. The comprehensive spending review in June 2025 confirmed GB Energy would have £8.3 billon to invest. However, there is no firm commitment around what proportion of this will go to the Local Power Plan. 

The UK Government has said that some of the profits from these local energy projects will go back to the community. One example of how this could be used is providing discounts on local energy bills.

An example of this type of community benefit that’s already in place is Fintry Development Trust in Scotland. A portion of the Fintry wind farm is owned by the community, so some of the wind farm’s profits come back to the people. In 2023, this profit took the form of £1,000 grants for households to install energy efficient upgrades.

For more information, read the Fintry Development Trust case study on Local Energy Scotland.

The UK Government has backed GB Energy with £8.3 billion in funding. It previously said that this will come from:

• an increased windfall tax on oil and gas companies (£1.2 billion over the course of the parliament)
• responsible borrowing

We’ll update this page as we know more about Great British Energy. In the meantime, sign up to Energywire, our monthly newsletter to stay up to date and get the latest news and tips on saving energy.

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