The Gate 2 evidence submission window has been extended following an announcement from NESO on Friday (25th July). All projects will now have up until at least the 18th August to submit their Gate 2 evidence to NESO or their relevant DNO.
The Story So Far
The DNO evidence submission window has been open since 20th May 2025. This was followed by the NESO submission window which opened on the 8th July, with both windows originally due to close on 29th July. However, on 16th July NESO announced that it would be extending the evidence submission window by a further 5 working days due to a significant number of problems faced by users attempting to submit evidence through the NESO portal.
On Friday last week (25th July) NESO announced that the submission window is to be further extended. NESO intend to provide notice of the window closure 10 working days in advance, no earlier than 4th August 2025. DNOs will mirror NESO’s timeline to provide equal opportunities for embedded projects to submit their evidence.
Common Issues
Projects have faced a significant number of issues relating to the NESO evidence submission including:
• File Size – Files required to be uploaded exceed the maximum file size allowed to be uploaded.
• Incorrect Project Information – Pre-populated project details on the portal are missing or do not match the current state of the project.
• Poor Clarity – Several questions were viewed as unclear or difficult to interpret.
By Friday 25th July NESO had received over 2600 queries from portal users having issues and has worked through these queries at pace, keeping a log of daily fixes to the portal. Despite this outstanding issues remain, meaning that some projects are still unable to submit their Gate 2 applications. For projects that have already submitted (perhaps with some workarounds where the portal did not work), NESO has stated projects that they will have a chance to review and amend their submission if needed.
Extension Timeline
NESO’s latest announced extension to the evidence submission window is to allow time for the remaining issues on the portal to be resolved to a point where the portal can be considered in working order. Once this is the case, NESO intend to provide notice of the window closure 10 working days in advance. Notice will not be given before 4th August 2025, in practice this means the earliest the evidence submission window could close would be the 18th August 2025, nearly 3 weeks following the initial intended closure.
This will likely result in the reformed process timeline being delayed such as confirmation of project contracts being pushed back from September to October, or later if the issues on the submission portal are not resolved by 4th August as planned.
NESO intend to publish an updated timeline in the coming week.
How Can TNEI Assist?
TNEI has extensive experience in the grid connection process and an in-depth understanding of the implemented reforms. Grid Connection support services that TNEI offer include:
• Support in the preparation and submission of Gate 2 evidence for both transmission and distribution projects including the required Red Line Boundary, and ModApp (if required)
• Independent assessment against the Gate 2 Criteria, indicating the likelihood of projects meeting the readiness criteria and protection clauses.
• Clean Power 2030 Analysis providing an estimation of the amount of capacity in each transmission and distribution zone set out in the Clean Power 2030 Action Plan including indicative queue positions for each project.
• Techno-commercial Gate 1 and Gate 2 offer reviews, highlighting key risks, opportunities and next steps.
If you would like support with your submission, please contact gridconnections@tneigroup.com.
