Who is my DNO, and do you actually need to know?

Your DNO, the Distribution Network Operator, is the company that owns the cables, substations and overhead lines connecting the property to the grid. It is decided by where the property is, not by who supplies the electricity. A customer who says "we're with EDF" is telling you their supplier, which is a billing arrangement that can change next month. The network is a physical asset, and it stays the same whoever they buy from.

The network operators

In Great Britain the licensed networks sit across six operator groups: UK Power Networks (London, the South East and East of England), National Grid Electricity Distribution (the Midlands, South West and South Wales), Northern Powergrid (the North East and Yorkshire), Electricity North West, SP Energy Networks (central and southern Scotland, Merseyside, North Wales and parts of the North West), and Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks (northern Scotland and a large area of southern England). In Northern Ireland, NIE Networks owns and runs the network, with its own connection process.

Many new-build estates, and some commercial sites, are on an Independent Distribution Network Operator instead. The ENA lists names like ESP Utilities Group, Energy Assets, GTC and Vattenfall Networks among them. The property still sits inside a regional DNO's area, but the part of the network it connects to belongs to the independent operator, and connection applications go to whoever owns that part of the network.

How to look it up

Enter the install postcode in our free DNO application checker. It tells you which network operator covers that postcode, flags the postcode areas split between two operators, and works out whether the job is a G98 notification or a G99 application from the system you're installing.

Two things are worth watching. Look up the install address rather than your office's, which is an easy slip when someone runs the check from habit. And the checker works from postcodes, so it can't tell you when a new-build estate is on an independent network. For those, and for any postcode near a boundary, the Energy Networks Association's own lookup at powercut105.com will confirm the operator, or the regional DNO's connections team can tell you whose network the property connects to.

When you don't need to know

For the connection application itself, you may never need the answer. Payaca submits G98 notifications and G99 applications through ENA Connect, the ENA's shared portal, straight from the job. You start the application from the project's Property tab, choose what you're installing, and Payaca works out whether it's a G98 or a G99 and sends it with the job's details. Nobody on your team picks the operator.

The status then comes back onto the project on its own, from awaiting assessment through to approval, or to further information required and works required when the operator needs something, so nobody is watching a separate portal to find out where it's got to.

Knowing the operator is still useful when something comes back, for example a works required status, an export limit, or a query about a new-build estate that turns out to be on an independent network. That's when the lookup above is useful. Payaca's DNO applications cover Great Britain, so for Northern Ireland you'll be working with NIE Networks directly.

G98 or G99 first

Which route the job needs changes what you send. Systems at or under 16A per phase go through G98: install, commission, then notify the operator within 28 days. Anything over that needs a full G99 application and approval before connection, with the assessment timescales and rejection reasons that G99 applications covers. The threshold is an aggregate across everything at the property, solar plus battery plus any other generation, which is why G98 or G99 is decided per job rather than per device. The DNO application checker works out which side of the line a design sits on, alongside the operator.

If you'd like DNO applications to run from the job rather than from a separate portal, see how grid connections work in Payaca or book a demo.