K. Sokolov Archive

Tag: Morocco renewable energy

  • Phantom Northern Pillar: The Missing Energy Cable from Morocco for Pelagos Data Centres

    August 13, 2026

    Gibraltar’s £1.8 billion Pelagos Data Centres — the largest infrastructure investment in the territory’s history — is backed by the government and funded by private capital. But its power source remains a matter of speculation, and the evidence suggests a project built on narrative rather than engineering reality.

    Pelagos Data Centres, announced in September 2025, promises a 250 MW campus on a 20,000 sq m site near the Port of Gibraltar, with the first phase due to become operational in late 2027. The facility is designed to be entirely off-grid, powered by a combination of renewable energy and liquefied natural gas. The project is backed by the Gibraltar Government, with Chief Minister Fabian Picardo describing it as a “massive investment” that will benefit the whole community.

    But the question that has hung over the project from the start is where the power will come from. The answer, according to the project’s chairman, Konstantin Sokolov and Christian Ryan, President for Gibraltar Operations, is Northern Pillar Energy — a consortium that claims to be developing a 4.2 GW solar-to-subsea-cable project connecting Morocco to Gibraltar, with fibre-optic capacity of up to 300 Tbps and a scheduled construction start in 2026.

    The problem is that the deeper one looks, the less substance there is to the claim. Northern Pillar Energy is, in effect, a consortium without members — no public list of participants, no disclosed investors, and no verifiable contracts.

    A BESS Developer, not a Сable Builder

    The energy project’s only named partner is KX Power, a UK-registered asset manager of utility-scale battery energy storage systems. According to UK corporate filings, KX Power Limited is a micro-entity with 10 employees, total assets of £14.9 million and cash in bank of £9.56 million. Its CEO is Dr. Zhe Zhang, a long-standing business partner of Konstantin Sokolov, mentioned in our blog many times. KX Power does not disclose its investors; its ultimate parent is registered in the British Virgin Islands.

    KX Power’s actual business is developing and managing utility-scale battery energy storage (BESS) systems. The company builds grid-scale batteries that provide frequency response, flexibility, and stabilisation services to the UK’s National Grid . Its portfolio includes an 80 MW/160 MWh project at Immingham, a 250 MW/500 MWh project in Scotland , and a joint venture with BlackRock backed by up to £200 million . A recent project was subject to a national security review by the UK government under the National Security and Investment Act, underscoring the sensitivity of its ownership structure.

    None of this relates to subsea HVDC cables. BESS is a short-duration, localised technology — batteries discharge for minutes to hours, providing flexibility within a single grid. A 4.2 GW intercontinental cable, by contrast, is a long-distance, high-capacity transmission asset requiring multi-billion-dollar supply chain commitments: cable manufacturing contracts, specialist cable-laying vessels, converter stations, and intergovernmental agreements. KX Power has demonstrated no expertise in HVDC transmission and has disclosed no contracts for such a project.

    The company’s core business — battery storage optimisation and grid services — is completely orthogonal to building a subsea power link across the Strait of Gibraltar. Its presence as Northern Pillar’s only named partner signals a limited technical and financial foundation for the project.

    Morocco’s Capacity: a Numbers Problem

    Morocco’s total renewable energy capacity at the end of 2025 was 4,851 MW, according to IRENA’s Renewable Capacity Statistics 2026. That is the entire installed renewable fleet of the kingdom: solar (1,086 MW), onshore wind (2,452 MW), hydropower (1,306 MW) and bioenergy (7 MW). Northern Pillar alone claims 4.2 GW — roughly 87% of Morocco’s entire current renewable capacity. By comparison, the NOOR Atlas programme currently under construction is adding only 225 MWp across four solar plants under MASEN.

    Morocco has achieved a renewable share of 39.6% of installed capacity, the highest in North Africa, but its priority remains domestic consumption, not large-scale export. The kingdom’s peak demand continues to grow, and its 814 MW of pumped hydro storage is designed to balance its own grid.

    The Morocco–Europe Connection: a Crowded Field

    Morocco already operates the only electricity interconnection between Africa and Europe — two 700 MW subsea cables across the Strait of Gibraltar, commissioned in 1997 and 2006, with bidirectional capacity of 1,400 MW . A third Morocco–Spain line, adding 700 MW, is planned for 2026 .

    Beyond Spain, several larger projects are at various stages of development:

    • Morocco–Portugal: In July 2026, the energy ministers of both countries formally agreed to build a 1 GW interconnection, estimated at €735–800 million. They will apply to the European Commission for funding and seek designation as a Project of Common European Interest (IPCEI).
    • Morocco–France: Mentioned in ONEE planning documents as a future connection, but no detailed project has been publicly presented. Xlinks is also reportedly exploring a French variant of its concept.
    • Morocco–Germany (Sila Atlantik): This is the most ambitious — and the most stalled. It is also, critically, the same developer as Xlinks. After the UK government withdrew support for the Morocco–UK cable in June 2025, Xlinks pivoted to Germany, launching a new vehicle called Sila Atlantik to keep the project alive.

    The Xlinks Precedent

    The comparison of Northern Pillar with Xlinks is unavoidable. Xlinks was a serious project: a 3.6 GW proposal to bring renewable energy from Morocco to the UK via 3,800 km of subsea cables, landing at Alverdiscott in Devon. It had secured 3.6 GW connection agreements with National Grid, had been designated a “project of National Significance” by the UK government, and had raised more than £100 million in development funding from investors including TotalEnergies, TAQA, Octopus Energy, and GE Vernova.

    Yet in June 2025, the UK government formally withdrew support. Energy Minister Michael Shanks stated that the scheme was “not in the UK national interest at this time” and “does not clearly align strategically with the government’s mission to build homegrown power here in the UK”. The government refused to grant a 25-year Contract for Difference (CfD) — a price guarantee that would have made the project financeable.

    Sir Dave Lewis, chair of Xlinks, said the company was “hugely surprised and bitterly disappointed”. But the decision was final. Xlinks is now exploring private off-takers — AI companies, cloud providers, data centres — as a fallback.

    The parallel with Northern Pillar is exact: without a government-backed price guarantee, a $30+ billion subsea cable project cannot attract the financing required to book cable manufacturing slots or secure specialist cable-laying vessels, which are already allocated years in advance.

    Northern Pillar’s Missing Architecture

    Northern Pillar lacks the elements that Xlinks spent years assembling:

    • No public agreement with MASEN. Morocco’s energy strategy is managed by the Moroccan Agency for Sustainable Energy. Xlinks had documented engagement; Northern Pillar’s website cites MASEN only as a source for Morocco’s renewable statistics, not as a project partner.
    • No land allocation in Morocco. A 4.2 GW solar complex would require thousands of hectares. The NOOR Ouarzazate complex, at 582 MW, is the world’s largest concentrated solar power plant and took years to develop. No such site has been identified for Northern Pillar.
    • No cable manufacturing or ship contracts. HVDC cable production and cable-laying vessels are booked years in advance. Xlinks had secured manufacturing slots; Northern Pillar has disclosed no such commitments.
    • No confirmed buyer. Gibraltar’s peak demand is approximately 80 MW. Taking 10% of a 4.2 GW cable would mean importing around 400 MW — five times the territory’s current peak consumption. The remaining 3.8 GW would need to be sold into European markets. There is no public evidence of agreements with Spain, the EU, or any corporate off-taker.

    A Timeline Fantasy

    Northern Pillar’s website states construction will begin in 2026. That would require contracts signed now, years before the industry’s manufacturing and installation capacity is available. Xlinks, with far more development work completed, was aiming for operations in the early 2030s.

    The reality of subsea HVDC infrastructure is that the supply chain is structurally constrained. Prysmian, Nexans and their peers have order books extending to the early 2030s. A project without advanced commitments to manufacturing slots and cable-laying vessels cannot begin construction in 2026 — regardless of how much capital it claims to be able to raise.

    Conclusion: a Narrative, Not a Project

    In previous articles we have examined Pelagos Data Centres from every angle — the constrained North Mole site, the marine-supported renders next to Waterport Terraces, the absence of a clear 20,000 sq m land plot, the proximity to the airport glide path and the residential blocks, the planning vacuum and the political scaffolding that currently holds the announcement together. Even if every one of those difficulties were somehow overcome, a more fundamental problem remains: where the power for Phases 2–5 is supposed to come from.

    The official story points to Northern Pillar Energy — a 4.2 GW solar-to-subsea-cable concept linking Morocco to Gibraltar. On the publicly available evidence that concept does not function. There is no disclosed consortium, no land allocation in Morocco, no agreement with MASEN, no cable manufacturing or vessel contracts, no confirmed offtakers for the surplus capacity, and a construction start date of 2026 that is incompatible with the realities of the HVDC supply chain. The only named industrial partner is a UK battery-storage developer whose actual business has nothing to do with intercontinental transmission. The precedent of Xlinks — a far more advanced project that still collapsed when government support was withdrawn — only sharpens the point.

    Pelagos may yet be built in some reduced form. But on current information it will not be powered by a cable from Morocco. Northern Pillar Energy is not a project. It is a narrative.

    Credits:

    1. Pelagos Data Centre: Built on Water https://ksokolovarchive.cc/2026/06/11/pelagos-data-centre-built-on-water/
    2. Pelagos Data Centre: The Three-Legged Stool https://ksokolovarchive.cc/2026/06/19/pelagos-data-centre-the-three-legged-stool/
    3. The Legal Architects: Hassans and the Inner Circle https://ksokolovarchive.cc/2026/06/25/the-legal-architects-hassans-and-the-inner-circle/
    4. PV Magazine (2025). UK rejects CfD bid for 10.5 GW Morocco solar-wind subsea cable. July 1, 2025. https://www.pv-magazine.com/2025/07/01/uk-rejects-cfd-bid-for-10-5-gw-morocco-solar-wind-subsea-cable/ 
    5. Energy Voice (2025). Xlinks ‘bitterly disappointed’ by Westminster rejection of Morocco-UK power project. June 25, 2025. https://www.energyvoice.com/renewables-energy-transition/575108/morocco-uk-power-project-rejected/ 
    6. HESPRESS English (2026). Morocco-Germany $30 billion undersea power project stalls over government guarantees. July 23, 2026. https://en.hespress.com/142509-morocco-germany-30-billion-undersea-power-project-stalls-over-government-guarantees.html 
    7. HESPRESS English (2026). Morocco-Germany $30 billion undersea power link stalled over project disagreements. July 22, 2026. https://en.hespress.com/142486-morocco-germany-30-billion-undersea-power-link-stalled-over-project-disagreements.html 
    8. Energy Partnership Morocco (2026). Sila Atlantik: New momentum for the direct electricity cable project between Morocco and Germany. February 9, 2026. https://energypartnership.ma/news/default-9d41ac044f0e3950b804b8ace12416ae/ 
    9. Portugal Resident (2026). Government prepares for energy interconnection with Morocco. July 21, 2026. https://www.portugalresident.com/government-prepares-for-energy-interconnection-with-morocco/ 
    10. AICEP Portugal Global (2026). Portugal, Morocco to Build Power Interconnection Project. July 21, 2026. https://portugalglobal.pt/en/news/2026/julho/portugal-morocco-to-build-power-interconnection-project/ 
    11. The New Arab (2025). Could Morocco’s green energy power half of Europe electricity?. September 26, 2025. https://www.newarab.com/news/could-morocco-supply-half-europes-energy-needs 
    12. London CIV (2023). BlackRock commits up to £200m to UK battery storage projects. https://londonciv.org.uk/news/blackrock-commits-up-to-ps200m-to-uk-battery-storage-projects