SSE Promises 100 Jobs at Montrose Port. The Wind Farm Paying for Them Is Not Approved Yet.
Estimated reading time: 4 minutes
In short. SSE Renewables announced on 28 September 2026 that it has selected Montrose Port, Angus, as its preferred operations and maintenance base for Berwick Bank B, a 1.4 gigawatt phase of its wider 4.1 gigawatt Berwick Bank offshore wind farm off Scotland's east coast, saying the base would support 100 new full-time jobs plus around 30 construction jobs during the port's redevelopment [1]. Berwick Bank B still needs a Final Investment Decision, which SSE itself says is expected "next year." The ledger logs an announced gain of 100, graded ANNOUNCED, status promised, sector energy, region Scotland, ai_cited: not-raised.
What was announced
Berwick Bank is SSE's name for a 4.1 gigawatt offshore wind development in the outer Firth of Forth, about 38 kilometres off Scotland's east coast; Berwick Bank B is one phase of it, sized at 1.4 gigawatts [1]. SSE Renewables said on 28 September that Montrose Port is its preferred choice to base the operations and maintenance work this phase would need once built, and put a number on what that means for the port: 100 new full-time jobs running the base, plus roughly 30 further jobs during the construction and redevelopment work at the port itself [1].
The announcement is explicit about what has not yet happened. Berwick Bank B has not reached a Final Investment Decision, the point at which SSE actually commits the capital to build it; the company's own release says that decision is expected "next year," meaning 2027 at the earliest [1]. Nothing about the 100 jobs exists yet: no one has been hired, no construction has started at the port for this phase, and the project itself could still not go ahead in its current form. SSE also notes that Berwick Bank's other phases, A and C, could add close to 300 further operational jobs between them, but only if each separately secures Contracts for Difference funding and reaches its own investment decision; that is a second, larger promise layered on top of the first, and neither is counted in this row.
How the ledger logs it
An announced gain of 100, graded ANNOUNCED, sector energy, region Scotland, ai_cited: not-raised. This is a single named employer at a single named site with a specific number attached, which is why it earns its own row in the ledger's gains total rather than sitting only in the promise register the way a diffuse, multi-site target would. But "announced" carries real weight here: the project this job figure depends on has not been approved for construction. Status is promised, not confirmed-future, because SSE has not yet set a date it can be held to beyond the general expectation of a 2027 decision.
What happens next in this ledger
This ledger is logging the promise now, at the point SSE made it, which is also the point least favourable to the company: a preferred-location announcement, not a construction start. Review dates are set for 28 September 2027 and 28 September 2028. The first review lands close to when the Final Investment Decision is supposed to happen, so the sharper test is whether that decision gets made at all, and if it does, whether the 100-job figure survives contact with an actual construction programme. If Berwick Bank B does not reach FID, this row will carry a stalled promise, not a broken one, and the distinction will matter to how it is written up.
Sources
- Offshore Source, "SSE selects Montrose Port as operations base for Berwick Bank B offshore wind farm," 28 September 2026. https://offshoresource.com/news/renewables/sse-selects-montrose-port-as-operations-base-for-berwick-bank-b-offshore-wind-farm