ScottishPower

From Powerbase
Revision as of 19:40, 15 April 2007 by Heather Kirk (talk | contribs) (→‎Indirect links with the Scottish Executive and the Scottish Parliament)
Jump to: navigation, search
Scottish Power logo[1]
Glasgow, Scotland[2]

ScottishPower Plc is a vertically integrated energy company headquartered in Glasgow, Scotland. It is the distribution network operator for the central and southern Scotland and the Merseyside and North Wales regions. The company also supplies electricity and natural gas to homes and business around the United Kingdom and generates power for supply to the grid. It also owns PPM Energy in the United States. ScottishPower is quoted on the London Stock Exchange as part of the FTSE 100 Index, and has a secondary listing on the New York Stock Exchange.

History

Scottish Power was formed in 1990, in preparation for the privatisation of the previously nationalised Scottish electricity industry the following year. Previously the UK government had privatised the English and Welsh electricity industry by splitting the market into 12 regional electricity companies (RECs) and two power generators. However in Scotland, the industry was already organised on an integrated generation, distribution and supply basis, and this integration survived the privatisation to become a model for the rest of the United Kingdom. Scottish Power was largely formed from of the larger of the two Scottish electricity boards, the South of Scotland Electricity Board, whilst the other, the North of Scotland Hydro Board, eventually became part of the Scottish and Southern Energy Group (the nuclear power stations in Scotland were spun off into a third company, Scottish Nuclear, which was not sold off with ScottishPower and Scottish Hydro Electric, but was sold later as part of British Energy).

Company Chronology

Divisons

Energy Retail

Scottish Power distribution areas [3]

The Energy Retail division contains Scottish Power Energy Retail Ltd which holds the gas and electricity supply licenses and has over 5.2 million customers in the UK. Also included in this division is SP Dataserve Ltd which is responsible for the metering and data management work and is the first ever meter reading company to allow customers to text in their meter readings[4].

Energy Networks

The Energy Networks business contains three asset owning companies SP Transmission Ltd - holds the transmission license for central and southern Scotland and owns the part of the Moyle Interconnector with Northern Ireland Electricity, SP Distribution Ltd - holds the distribution licence for central and southern Scotland and SP Manweb Plc - holds the distribution licence for North Wales, Merseyside and Cheshire. A fourth asset management business SP Power Systems Ltd maintains and repairs the distribution networks on behalf of the owners and acts as the Distribution Network Operator. The work on the transmission grid is carried out by National Grid plc.

Energy Wholesale

Energy Wholesale contains two companies ScottishPower Generation Ltd which generates 6,200MW of electricity power in the United Kingdom using coal fired thermal power stations, combined cycle power stations, hydro-electric schemes, pumped storage generation and substantial wind farms.On 2006-04-27 Scottishpower were granted permission to build Europe's largest on-shore windfarm. The 322 MW / 140 turbine site will cost an estimated £300m and cover an area of approximately 55 km² of moorland south of Glasgow. Also within this division is ScottishPower Energy Management Ltd which is responsible for buying and selling wholesale energy.

PPM Energy

PPM Energy Inc was previously the competitive arm Pacificorp but was made a separate business in 2002. It is involved in renewable energy and gas storage amongst other things in the US.


Subsidiaries

Manweb

Scottish Power was the larger of the two Scottish energy companies and benefited from being both a generator and supplier of power. In 1995 it acquired the English Regional Electricity Company, Manweb which supplied Merseyside and North Wales. In 1996 the company diversified into the water supply business with the purchase of Southern Water (which was sold again in 2002). When the supply of energy into British homes was opened up to competition, ScottishPower entered this market, stealing share from the previous gas supply monopoly British Gas and also building new market share in England and Wales.

Thus

Scottish Power established the telecommunications company, Thus (originally known as ScottishTelecom). This was floated on the London Stock Exchange with ScottishPower retaining a 20% stake, until 2002 when it sold its interest.

Pacificorp

In 2000, Scottish Power completed the acquisition of Pacificorp which supplies electricity in the western United States, which operates as Pacific Power (in the regulated energy industries of the states of Oregon, Wyoming, Washington, and California), and as Utah Power (in the regulated energy industries of the states of Idaho and Utah). In May 2005 ScottishPower announced that it had agreed to sell Pacificorp to MidAmerican Energy Holdings Company, a company controlled by Warren Buffet's company Berkshire Hathaway, for US$5.1 billion in cash and US$4.3 billion in debt and preferred stock. The successful completion of the deal was announced on 21 March 2006, after securing regulatory approvals. The deal did not include PPM Energy (which as Pacificorp Power Marketing was formerly the non-regulated subsidiary of Pacificorp). Scottish Power intends to return a large proportion of the proceeds to its shareholders.

Rejected takeover bid from E.ON

Following the announcement, the group's share price rose, but were now widely seen as vulnerable to a takeover. It was soon revealed that German energy group E.ON, who also own Powergen, were interested in a takeover. On November 22 2005 the board rejected an offer from E.ON of 570 pence a share, which would have valued the group at £10.7 billion. [5]

Takeover bid from Iberdrola

On November 28 2006, the board of directors of ScottishPower agreed to a £11.6 billion takeover bid by the Spanish energy firm Iberdrola[6]. If approved by shareholders next year, the deal could create Europe's third largest utility company.

People

Board

  • Charles Miller Smith Joined the Board as Deputy Chairman in August 1999 and was appointed as Chairman in April 2000.
  • Euan Baird Joined the Board in January 2001 and brings executive level experience in the electronics and engineering industry to the ScottishPower Board.
  • Donald Brydon Joined the Board in May 2003 and is the senior independent director.
  • Nick Rose Joined the Board in February 2003 and he is Chairman of the Audit Committee, nominated as the Committee’s designated “financial expert”.
  • Nancy Wilgenbusch Joined the Board in June 2004.
  • Peter Hickson Joined the Board on 1st September 2006.

Management Team

Source, March 2007.

Previous Members

Fat Cat payoffs

The gas and electricity provider's former chief executive Ian Russell and three colleagues received £10.9m for pay and pension compensation. The sums have been branded 'obscene' by the Scottish National Party energy spokesman Richard Lochhead, and come to light just three months after the electricity and gas provider warned customers about inflation-busting bill hikes.

Mr Russell, who left in January this year after five years as chief executive, received a £2.3m compensation payment as well as benefiting from a resultant pension top-up of £2.7m. The compensation sum is more than three times his salary of £648,000, while his pension windfall nearly doubled his total entitlement to £6.8m. His colleagues Charles Berry and David Nish, who both left the firm last September, pocketed a total of £2.6m and £2.2m in extra compensation and extra pension sums respectively. And Judi Johansen, the former head of the company's PacifiCorp arm that was sold this year, walked off with a total of £1.1m.

The figures are published in Scottish Power's 2005/06 annual report and accounts, and are on top of their normal pay and pension entitlements totalling a further £10.5m. The plc made £675m profit before tax in the financial year to March 2006. Scottish Power raised gas prices by 15% and electricity by 8% in March this year, only to warn that bills would rise again due to high wholesale costs. [7]

Direct links with the Scottish Executive & the Scottish Parliament

Scottish Executive

Press Releases - “ScottishPower Plans to Turn Open-cast Mine into Windfarm and Bird Habitat – 24 May 2002 - ScottishPower today (Thursday) submitted plans to the Scottish Executive for a £70 million windfarm on the site of an abandoned open cast mine at Black Law near the village of Forth in South Lanarkshire. ScottishPower, in partnership with the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds and landowners, has developed a habitat management plan that integrates nature conservation, windfarm operation, and other land uses on the site which has been derelict since coal mining activities ceased there.” - “ScottishPower Announces Proposals for Third Large-Scale Scottish Windfarm – 30 Jan 2003 – the Scottish Executive is aware of the project and if approved Harestanes windfarm alone could met a third of the scottish Executive’s renewable energy target of 18% by 2010.” - “ScottishPower Spearheads Drive to Advise Business on the Climate Change Levy – 16 June 2004 - ScottishPower in partnership with the Scottish Energy Office of the Scottish Executive today launched a nationwide campaign to make businesses aware of the introduction of the Government's Climate Change Levy (CCL). The CCL is a tax that will be the major force behind the Government's commitment to reduce the UK's production of greenhouse gases by 12.5 per cent, compared to 1990 levels, by 2010.” - “ScottishPower Brings Al Gore’s ‘An Inconvenient Truth’ to Schools – 18 Jan 2007 - Former US Vice President Al Gore’s climate change film, An Inconvenient Truth, will be shown in all of Scotland’s Secondary Schools this year thanks to an initiative from ScottishPower and the Scottish Executive. The Scottish Executive, through Learning Teaching Scotland, is developing a package of educational materials to help raise awareness of the challenges we all face from global warming. Stephen Dunn, ScottishPower’s HR and Communications Director, said; “I was greatly impressed by An Inconvenient Truth. Not only does it powerfully explain what is happening to the planet, it also gives hope by simply setting out what we can still do to fight climate change. ScottishPower is already the biggest generator of onshore wind energy in the UK and is developing biomass and wave generation to reduce emissions and combat global warming – but it is essential that we also help promote understanding of this crucial challenge through initiatives such as this.” - “ScottishPower to Build World’s Biggest Wave Project off Orkney – 20 Feb 2007 – ScottishPower, working closely with the Scottish Executive, today announced a £10m wave power project designed to push Scotland to the forefront of global marine energy development. ScottishPower's Director of Renewables, Keith Anderson, said: "This is a massive step forward. It will be a test of the actual devices that will be used commercially and, if successful, should help propel Scotland into the forefront of marine energy throughout the world.” Brochures & Posters - “ScottishPower Windfarm Biodiversity Conservation Strategy” – ScottishPower renewables - “It’s Our Future schools’ competition” – ScottishPower gas and electricity & Natural Scotland Scottish Executive Reports - “SCOTLAND PLC: The Scottish Executive’s corporate links - Despite the pro-business outlook of McConnell and the Scottish executive, corporate lobbyists still find it worthwhile to swarm around the Scottish Parliament in an attempt to secure meetings with MSPs, to influence Scottish public spending in their favour and to keep polluting Scotland without major penalties. The incestuous relationships between the Scottish Parliament and corporations extend beyond external lobbying, however. Take for example the corporate swamping of cross party policy discussion groups that meet within the Scottish Parliament. The Scottish Executive has seen further controversy over its cosy connections with corporations. Since its creation, business representatives have had access as secondees to the Executive and civil servants have been seconded outwards to the private sector. Companies involved include the biggest Scottish and transnational corporations, with inward secondments from ScottishPower.” http://www.corporatewatch.org/?lid=1305 Spinwatch articles - “Taking The Risk Out Of Devolution - David Miller, 6 September 2004 - Since the creation of the Scottish Executive, business representatives have had access as secondees to the Executive and civil servants have been seconded outwards to the private sector. Companies involved include the biggest Scottish and Trans-National corporations, Inward: Scottish Power, Scottish and Newcastle, Stagecoach, Ernst and Young, PriceWaterhouseCoopers. Outward: Lloyds TSB Foundation, Scottish Power, McGrigor Donald (law firm and lobbyist), Scottish and Newcastle and business lobby groups Business in the Community and the Scottish Chambers of Commerce.” (http://www.spinwatch.org/content/view/15/8/)

Scottish Parliament

The Scottish Parliament Business Exchange - “NEW SCHEME PROMOTES MUTUAL UNDERSTANDING BETWEEN MSPs AND SCOTTISH BUSINESSES – 27 Nov 2001 - MSPs are to be given an opportunity to gain a valuable insight into the diverse Scottish business sector thanks to a new scheme launched today. The Scottish Parliament and Business Exchange ('The Exchange') aims to develop and provide opportunities for promoting mutual understanding between MSPs and business and related communities in Scotland. The Exchange is registered as an educational charity with a board made up of 50 per-cent Parliamentarians and 50 per-cent business representatives. "Through being transparent, open, inclusive and flexible in its approach, The Exchange will be able to bring MSPs and the business community together in a non-lobbying and non-partisan way, providing benefits to the whole of Scotland.” The Board of The Exchange was set-up at the first AGM in June this year. The Parliament's Chief Executive, Paul Grice, is the convener, and Sir David Steel MSP is the honorary President. The Board members are Elaine Thomson MSP, Brian Adam MSP, David Davidson MSP, Keith Raffan MSP, Lynda Gauld (Pfizer), Alan Wilson (SCDI), Miller McLean (Royal Bank of Scotland), Dominic Fry (Scottish Power), Alastair Smith (BAA Scottish Airports) and Bill Spiers (Scottish TUC). http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/nmCentre/news/news-01/pa01-089.htm - “Official Report 28 February 2007 – Energy Debt - Patrick Harvie (Glasgow) (Green): I was pleased to see that we received briefings from a number of other organisations, including Barnardo's and Capability Scotland, which want Parliament to understand the impact that energy debt has on a range of different people in diverse family situations. Energy suppliers will always have a problem with billing systems for the most vulnerable people, but some of their practices, as Scott Barrie mentioned, hit the poorest households and families hardest. In the case of Scottish Power's practices, they had not even calculated what it would cost Scottish Power to change the policy by writing off such debt. The role of politicians is not just to engage with suppliers on the issue but to look at public policy. Scott Barrie explained the historical situation in terms of the welfare state but, as we move further into the 21st century, the job for politicians is to prepare all citizens and households in Scotland for the period after cheap energy. It falls on all suppliers, including Scottish Power, to adjust their systems to ensure that the most vulnerable people are not placed in further debt. Christine Grahame (South of Scotland) (SNP): Energy companies are making a financial killing on the back of the less well-off. Figures that I have obtained show that some companies are charging customers who will not pay by direct debit almost £300 a year more. With regard to the overcharging of non-direct debit customers for gas and electricity combined, the worst offenders—I will name and shame them—were npower, Powergen and Scottish Power. The worst companies for customers who required only electricity and who chose not to pay by direct debit were npower, Powergen and Scottish Power. Jackie Baillie (Dumbarton) (Lab): Come on, Scottish Power—stop back-charging customers and stop back-charging the people who are potentially the most vulnerable customers. I echo the call for Scottish Power to end immediately its practice of backdating and to acknowledge that prepayment meter tariffs are a mess.” http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/business/officialReports/meetingsParliament/or-07/sor0228-02.htm - “Taking The Risk Out Of Devolution - David Miller, 6 September 2004 - the Scottish Parliament Business Exchange was set up to allow MSPs to be educated about the realities of business life. To ensure that education and not lobbying took place the scheme was required to be ‘non-lobbying’. But in practice three quarters of the business representatives taking part were lobbyists. The SPBE’s other founding principles were openness and accountability.” (http://www.spinwatch.org/content/view/15/8/)

Indirect links with the Scottish Executive & the Scottish Parliament

Scottish Power sponsors community activities such as ScottishPower Learning, SEPA and BWEA ScottishPower Learning (flagship corporate community programme focused on education/employability) a) School-based programmes designed to support the school to work transition b) Community-based programmes designed to help unemployed young people build their skills in preparation for work (Involved with Prince’s Trust, Community Champions, Project Scotland) c) Work-based programmes designed to provide young people with work experience and vocational training -think tanks “an organization, institute, corporation, or group that conducts research, typically funded by governmental and commercial clients, in the areas of social or political strategy, technology, and armament. Critics such as Ralph Nader have suggested that because of the private nature of the funding of think tanks their results are biased to a varying degree. Some critics go further to assert think tanks are little more than propaganda tools for promoting the ideological arguments of whatever group established them. They charge that most think tanks, which are usually headquartered in state or national seats of government, exist merely for large-scale lobbying to form opinion in favor of special private interests.” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Think_tank) -policy planning Scottish Environmental Protection Agency: - “a powerful non-departmental public body in Scotland sponsored by the Scottish Executive Environment and Rural Affairs Department. SEPA was established by the Environment Act 1995 and is responsible for the protection of the natural environment in Scotland. Its area of competence includes air, land, freshwater and marine environments.” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scottish_Environment_Protection_Agency) B(ritish)W(Ind)E(energy)A(ssociation): - “BP joins renewable power campaign group - Terry Macalister, December 27, 2006 - BP is to throw its weight behind the renewable power industry by joining its main campaigning body. Critics in the environment movement may be suspicious of a company they believe talks about green issues but invests little. Shell has been a member for some years and other big power producers, such as Centrica, owner of British Gas, E.ON of Germany and Scottish Power, have also joined.” (http://www.spinwatch.org/content/view/3886/9/)


PR agencies

Other activities

Lobby connections

Business Council for Sustainable Development – UK - “UK affiliate of the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (http://www.wbcsd.ch). It claims to promote sustainable development, but is in fact the key peak business association lobbying against sustainability.” (http://spinprofiles.org/index.php/BCSD-UK) - “The second pillar of business power is said to be the political activities of business including its sponsorship of party conferences, donations to parties, lobbying, PR, the creation and use of front groups, seemingly independent institutes and apparently enlightened business networks. One such that has emerged in Scotland in recent months if the creation of the Scottish steering group of the Business Council for sustainable Development- UK (BCSD-UK). In fact the WBCSD is at the forefront of corporate attempts to undermine environmental action, lobbying worldwide against regulation and in favour of voluntary ‘solutions’. In Scotland the environmentally conscious members of the BCSD include road building consultancy Scott Wilson, the biggest users of natural (Water) resources Scottish Power. The WBCSD is a peak business lobby group dedicated to resisting environmental progress. In Scotland it is at the heart of the policy process. Maybe this is quite routine these days, but when was the last time you heard of a business lobby group set up to influence government policy being funded by the very government being targeted. For some pulling the strings the election of the parliament posed a problem since it had the potential to represent some elements of popular interests, thus there was lots of discussion about how the parliament could be 'educated' (read lobbied) about business. In particular it was argued that most MSPs had no experience of business and that their main experience was in the public sector. To rectify this, the Scottish Parliament Business Exchange was set up…” (http://www.spinwatch.org/content/view/15/8/) Lobby stuff from SpinWatch: - “Corporate power, institutional corruption - David Miller, September/October 2003 - For some on the left discussion of the power of Westminster may well be code for the power of the Transnational Corporations (TNCs), but it is not enough to leave matters there. Big business does not just rule Scotland via Westminster, it also rules by direct if often low profile and covert engagement in Scottish politics. How is this power accomplished? ‘social movements for global capitalism’. These include all sorts of corporate lobby groups and the burgeoning lobbying and PR industry. Scottish based TNCs such as HBOS and Scottish Power are pretty well integrated into the European and global lobby groups. Their integration into global governance means that the macro level terms of trade and of political regulation are already fixed at the global, European and UK levels. Scottish governance is subject to specific corporate influence. In a devolved Scotland the most obvious way in which corporate actors pursue their interests is by lobbying. But lobbying takes place in the context of already entrenched policy assumptions and a political culture which is already fundamentally oriented to wards the market. It is against this background - which is fundamentally favourable to big business - that lobbying for particular policy measures takes place. Nevertheless lobbying is seen as worthwhile by business interests as evidenced in the burgeoning lobbying and PR market which emerged post devolution. SSP MSPs have already been persistently approached by lobbyists - with some even offering steadily increasing donations to charity to secure meetings with the MSPs. One senior MSP confesses to being gobsmacked at the number of MSPs who are routinely schmoozed and lunched by lobbyists. It is no surprise that lobbyists swarm around the Parliament. It has significant power over budgets which some of the big corporations want to get their hands on. The drug companies also have an interest along with other TNCs in keeping the Scottish political system sweet so they can continues to pollute Scotland without major penalties. These include BP, Scottish Power, GlaxoSmithKline, Exxon Mobil, Scottish and Southern Energy and others. A more serious problem is that the main target of corporations and their lobbyists is the Executive, meaning both ministers and civil servants. Here there is an extremely murky world of networks, professional, political and personal associations between lobbyists, ministers and civil servants. These developments indicate the fundamental problem of the degraded democratic system we have in Scotland. Big business has already infiltrated the very structure and operating assumptions of the public services - including the civil service.” (http://www.spinwatch.org/content/view/96/8/)

Cultural Affiliations/Sponsorships

Fun Facts

External Links

ScottishPower website [8]
ScottishPower Gas and Electricity Customer website [9]
ScottishPower Energy Networks website [10]

References

  1. ^ Photograph from WikipediaScottish Power, accessed 22 March 2007.
  2. ^ Photograph from WikipediaGlasgow, accessed 22 March 2007.
  3. ^Sacked power chiefs get 'obscene' pay-off This is Money, 18 June 2006.
  4. ^ Photograph from ScottishPower Energy Networkshomepage, accessed 1 April 2007.
Retrieved from "https://powerbase.info/index.php?title=ScottishPower&oldid=21782"