Background
National Grid Electricity Transmission (NGET) awarded two subsea-cable research contracts to the University of Southampton on 6 October 2026: SCHUBERT, on cable health and security sensing, worth £1.34m, and SABRES, on how seabed life responds to cable electromagnetic fields, worth £860,000.
NGET is the subsidiary of National Grid plc that owns and maintains the 400 kV and 275 kV transmission network in England and Wales; Scotland has its own transmission owners. Since 1 October 2024 the publicly owned National Energy System Operator has run the grid in real time. Ofgem regulates NGET under the RIIO-T3 price control for 2026 to 2031.
NGET is a separate company from National Gas, the former gas transmission Arm of National Grid. Its subsea research matters because offshore wind and new seabed links put more of the network on the seabed, where cables are exposed to damage and sabotage.