Sector
Project controls for UK energy programmes.
Schedule, cost and risk management for oil and gas, offshore wind, solar, grid infrastructure and energy transition programmes — built for the complexity the sector demands.
UK energy programmes — from offshore platform decommissioning to onshore wind farm construction to grid reinforcement and net-zero industrial decarbonisation — share a common set of controls challenges: long lead procurement, contractor interface complexity, regulatory hold points and funding structures that require defensible cost and schedule confidence at each investment gate.
SOMA delivers project controls into energy programmes where the controls function must keep pace with procurement reality and provide sponsors with the confidence intervals they need to make investment decisions. We understand the FEED-to-FID transition, the role of QRA in project sanction, and the earned value reporting that asset owners need to see through delivery.
The regulatory overlay on UK energy work is heavier than on most infrastructure and varies sharply by sub-sector. Onshore and offshore wind development goes through the Planning Inspectorate and, for projects above 100MW onshore or 50MW offshore, the Nationally Significant Infrastructure Project (NSIP) regime under the Planning Act 2008 — a DCO process that can take three to five years and creates hard, immovable schedule constraints the QRA model has to represent honestly. Grid connection works fall under Ofgem regulation, the Connection and Use of System Code (CUSC), and the multi-year queue that the National Energy System Operator (NESO, formerly ESO) is managing through the TMO4+ reforms. Oil and gas decommissioning operates under the Offshore Petroleum Regulator for Environment and Decommissioning (OPRED) regime and the OGA stewardship expectations. Nuclear new build and SMR work sits under the Office for Nuclear Regulation's Generic Design Assessment and site licensing process. None of these regulatory tracks is optional, none runs on the developer's preferred timeline, and any QRA model that does not represent them as genuine probabilistic constraints is understating the schedule risk.
Funding and revenue mechanisms shape the controls problem in ways unique to this sector. Most large UK renewable generation projects depend on Contracts for Difference (CfD) revenue support; the Allocation Round timetable, the strike price clearing dynamics, and the milestone delivery date in the CfD contract become primary schedule drivers that have to flow through into the Accepted Programme. The Regulated Asset Base (RAB) model now being deployed for nuclear new build (Sizewell C) creates a different controls regime again — one closer to a regulated utility than to a merchant developer. For decommissioning, the NDA-funded estate, the cessation-of-production approval, and the Decommissioning Security Agreement all impose their own cost-reporting cadence. The controls function on a credible energy programme has to translate between commercial finance reality, regulatory milestones, and engineering delivery — and produce a single integrated forecast that the investment committee can sign off against the project finance model.
Delivery challenges in this sector
FEED-to-FID controls integrity
The transition from Front-End Engineering Design to Final Investment Decision is where cost and schedule confidence is most critical — and most often overstated. QRA at FEED stage that is structured for the information available, rather than reverse-engineered to fit a target figure, is what gives a board the confidence to sanction.
Long-lead equipment and procurement risk
Offshore wind foundations, subsea cables, high-voltage transformers and specialist vessels have procurement lead times that can exceed two years. The schedule and cost consequences of procurement slippage must be modelled explicitly and managed actively — not absorbed into a contingency line that nobody tracks.
Regulatory hold points and interface risk
Energy programmes face regulatory hold points — environmental permits, grid connection agreements, marine consents, planning conditions — that can halt construction activity. These hold points must be reflected in the schedule as real constraints, and their probability of delay must be captured in the risk register and QRA model.
Net-zero programme cost volatility
Rapid technology evolution, supply chain constraints and policy uncertainty create cost volatility on net-zero programmes that conventional estimating methods underestimate. Three-point cost estimates anchored to recent comparable project data, with explicit escalation assumptions, are essential for defensible funding submissions.
How SOMA approaches Energy programmes
We bring the same AACE-standard QRA methodology to energy programmes that we apply on infrastructure and defence — adapted to the specific characteristics of energy project data, procurement risk and regulatory hold points. Our cost and schedule work is designed to give investment committees the honest confidence intervals they need, not the comfortable numbers the project team wishes were true.
Standards and frameworks
- AACE International — Total Cost Management Framework
- AACE Recommended Practices (57R-09, 113R-20, 118R-21)
- HM Treasury Green Book
- IPA (Infrastructure and Projects Authority)
- FEED stage estimating — AACE Class 3 to Class 2
- ISO 31000 — Risk Management
Further reading
Practitioner guide
The Honest Guide to QRA
What quantitative risk analysis actually produces, where it goes wrong on energy programmes, and what a credible QRA model needs before an investment committee will trust it.
Read the guide →
Practitioner guide
Integrated Cost-Schedule Risk Analysis — When EMV Isn't Enough
Why treating cost and schedule risk as separate models understates real exposure — and how to run an integrated analysis that reflects the true correlation between them.
Read the guide →
Methodology hub
Frequently asked
Energy project controls — questions we get asked
- Can SOMA deliver QRA at FEED stage when cost and schedule data are still developing?
- Yes. FEED-stage QRA is one of the most valuable applications of quantitative risk analysis precisely because uncertainty is high. We structure models that are honest about the limits of the current information — wider distributions, scenario-based risks, explicit escalation assumptions — and that produce a confidence range the investment committee can actually use rather than a false-precision P80 that will be wrong within six months.
- Does SOMA have experience with offshore programmes?
- Yes. Our practitioners have worked on offshore oil and gas, offshore wind and subsea infrastructure programmes. We understand the particular schedule drivers — marine weather windows, vessel availability, port access — and the cost structure of offshore work. We apply this context to QRA models rather than treating an offshore programme as a generic construction project.
- Can SOMA support net-zero and decarbonisation programmes?
- Yes. Industrial decarbonisation, hydrogen production, battery storage and grid reinforcement programmes are a growing part of our work. The controls challenges — immature supply chains, technology cost uncertainty, policy-dependent revenue assumptions — require careful scoping of what the QRA can and cannot assert, and we are experienced in being transparent about those boundaries.
- How does SOMA handle escalation in energy project cost models?
- We treat escalation as an explicit, modelled input rather than a fixed percentage added to the base estimate. We use published indices where they exist — BCIS, ONS, sector-specific benchmarks — and we model the uncertainty in those indices where a programme has significant exposure. For long-duration energy programmes, the difference between a flat escalation assumption and a properly modelled escalation uncertainty can be material to the P80 cost figure.
Working on a Energy programme?
Most engagements start with a short call. We work out whether we're the right fit, then come back with a short scoping note — scope, duration, team, indicative cost.