POWER utility Scottish & Southern Energy has mapped out its preferred route for a new £200 million power cable to carry electricity south from Scotland’s growing batch of wind farms.

The Perth-based group earmarked funds last year for the transmission project from a £1 billion investment pot, and called for urgent regulatory approval to boost the prospects of renewable energy in the UK.

Chief executive Ian Marchant said: "Only the delivery of the necessary infrastructure will enable Scotland’s renewable energy ambitions to become a reality.

"It is vital that the wide support that exists for developing renewables in Scotland translates into a commitment to enabling this nationally-important infrastructure project to become a reality as soon as possible."

SSE said it aimed to start work next year on the 124-mile line from Beauly, near Inverness, to Denny near Stirling.

The 400,000 volt line will replace an old 132,000 volt cable designed before the wind farm boom, and is scheduled to be operating in late 2007. SSE said the plans remain subject to environmental approvals, which, if granted, would see 75 per cent of the line built on a similar route to the existing line.

The group is now embarking on a further round of consultation on the preferred route, and on additional environmental studies, with a view to submitting an application to the Scottish Executive later this year.

"We will continue to work very closely with local authorities, statutory and non-statutory bodies, the Scottish Executive and others," said Mr Marchant.

Wind farm developments are becoming increasingly popular thanks to Government incentives aimed at reducing the carbon dioxide emissions from traditional power generation, which are blamed for the damaging effects of global warming.

Earlier this week the Government said it would cut CO2 emissions in excess of its international treaty obligations, prompting howls of protest from industry bodies but muted approval from generators. Energy Minister Stephen Timms said the plans would cut CO2 emissions by 20 per cent from 1990 levels by 2010, but the Energy Intensive Users Group, the industrial consumer lobby group, warned they would lead to uncompetitive electricity prices and force companies overseas.

Andrew Wright, utilities analyst at investment bank UBS, said: "The big winners are the low carbon generators. SSE will do well. Coal generators will do less well."

The proposals, part of a European Union-wide scheme, exceed Britain’s obligation under the Kyoto Protocol on climate change to cut 12.5 per cent off its 1990 levels. Emissions have already been cut by about eight per cent.

EU countries must submit proposals to Brussels by March on how they will meet Kyoto targets and approved plans will come into effect in 2005.

SSE is itself one of Britain’s leading wind farm developers, and Scottish sites, offshore and onshore, make up a large proportion of planned and existing wind farms.

Mr Marchant said: "The existing line was originally built to serve a very rural area with very low demand for electricity. It was not designed to cope with the large number of requests for connections to the electricity network which we are currently receiving from renewable energy developers.

"Publication of the preferred route for a new line is, therefore, an important milestone in our plans to upgrade the electricity infrastructure and thereby facilitate the growth of renewables in Scotland."