Artfield Fell Wind Farm Open

Scottish & Southern Energy PLC
27 July 2005


UK Minister for Energy Opens Artfield Fell Wind Farm

Energy Minister Malcolm Wicks MP today officially opened Scottish and Southern
Energy's 20MW (megawatt) wind farm at Artfield Fell in Dumfries and Galloway.

The wind farm, which is situated 10 miles north east of Stranraer and consists
of fifteen turbines, will produce enough energy to power around 15,000 homes. It
cost £16m to develop.

Artfield Fell is SSE's third operational wind farm, and takes the total capacity
of the company's wind farms to 42MW. The company expects to complete the
construction of the Hadyard Hill wind farm in South Ayrshire (120MW) during this
financial year and is in the process of applying for consent to develop seven
other wind farms in Scotland, with a total capacity of almost 450MW.

In addition, SSE announced on 6 July plans to enter into a joint venture with
Viking Energy to develop what would be the world's largest community-backed wind
farm, with a capacity of up to 600MW, on the Shetland Islands.

The company also announced on 30 June, with BP, ConocoPhillips and Shell plans
to commence engineering design of the world's first industrial scale project to
generate 'carbon free' electricity from hydrogen at Peterhead in North East
Scotland.

Mr Wicks said:

'I welcome this latest development from a company with a long history of
involvement in hydro generation, and now wind energy. SSE is also supporting and
developing other renewable energy sources such as deep water offshore wind
farms, tidal energy, solar power and biomass generation. This demonstrates our
incentives are achieving their desired effect of spurring companies to look at
all renewable energy possibilities.'

Ian Marchant, Chief Executive of SSE, said:

'Artfield Fell is the first of our wind farms which we have taken from
conception to delivery. Its completion marks an important step forward in our
plans to have around 1,000MW of generation capacity qualifying for Renewable
Obligation Certificates by 2008.

I am particularly grateful for the constructive approach to the development
adopted by Dumfries and Galloway Council and by the local community in
Wigtownshire. Our priority now is to complete the construction of the Hadyard
Hill wind farm and to make a further contribution to the achievement of
Scotland's and the UK's renewable energy targets.'

Enquiries to:

Scottish and Southern Energy
Alan Young, Director of Corporate Communications          0870 900 0410
Denis Kerby Investor and Media Relations Manager          0870 900 0410



                      This information is provided by RNS
            The company news service from the London Stock Exchange