Makes the energy
Generation
Competitive market of licensed generators, with different owners and technologies.
← Energy & bills
Energy & bills · Ownership · Great Britain
Who owns which part of the energy system?
Generation and supply are competitive markets of listed groups, private companies and UK subsidiaries of overseas parents. The wires are regional monopolies owned by private investors and regulated by Ofgem. The system operator has been publicly owned since October 2024.
Evidence last reviewed 3 October 2026
1. Four parts, owned and regulated differently
Moves the energy
Networks
Regional monopolies. Ofgem regulates what transmission and distribution operators may spend and earn.
Keeps the system balanced
System operation
Publicly owned NESO balances supply and demand and plans the network; public ownership began on 1 October 2024.
Bills the customer
Supply
Competitive market. The price cap limits default tariffs, not every household’s total bill.
Who controls each company matters for different reasons in each part: for networks, because customers pay a regulated return to their owners (see the public-ownership model); for supply and generation, because of competition, resilience and where profits go.
Every company number, name, status and ownership relationship below was read from the Companies House register on 28 August 2026. Where the register is silent about who controls a company, this page says so rather than filling the gap. It does not show executive pay.
2. Three kinds of company, often described as one
UK-listed plc
4
Centrica / British Gas, SSE, Drax, National Grid
UK subsidiary of a foreign parent
3
EDF (UK), E.ON UK, ScottishPower (Iberdrola)
UK private company
2
OVO Energy, Octopus Energy
3. Company by company
Centrica / British Gas
No controlling party on the registerUK-listed plc · Supplier · Generator · Vertically integrated
CENTRICA PLC — company 03033654, active, incorporated March 1995
Other entities in the group (3)
- BRITISH GAS TRADING LIMITED (03078711) — Licensed retail supply company (British Gas)
- GB GAS HOLDINGS LIMITED (03186121) — Intermediate holding company
- CENTRICA HOLDINGS LIMITED (05625463) — Intermediate holding company
The register does not say. Companies whose voting shares are admitted to trading on a UK regulated market are outside the Part 21A PSC regime. Their large shareholders are disclosed through DTR 5 major-shareholding notifications, not through Companies House. An empty PSC register for a listed plc therefore means "the regime does not apply", not "nobody owns it" — and the two must never be reported the same way.
EDF (UK)
No controlling party on the registerUK subsidiary of a foreign parent · Supplier · Generator · Vertically integrated
EDF ENERGY HOLDINGS LIMITED — company 06930266, active, incorporated June 2009
Other entities in the group (4)
- EDF ENERGY CUSTOMERS LIMITED (02228297) — Licensed retail supply company
- EDF ENERGY LIMITED (02366852) — Intermediate holding company
- EDF ENERGY NUCLEAR GENERATION LIMITED (03076445) — Nuclear generation company
- EDF ENERGY (UK) LIMITED (02622406) — Top UK holding company (chain terminus)
Who controls it, as the register states
- EDF ENERGY (UK) LIMITED (02622406) — owns 75–100% of shares; holds 75–100% of voting rights; can appoint and remove directors
E.ON UK
Controlling parent named on the registerUK subsidiary of a foreign parent · Supplier · Generator
E.ON UK LIMITED — company 02366970, active, incorporated April 1989
Other entities in the group (2)
- E.ON NEXT ENERGY LIMITED (03782443) — Licensed retail supply company (E.ON Next)
- E.ON UK HOLDING COMPANY LIMITED (01313782) — Top UK holding company
Who controls it, as the register states
- E.ON UK HOLDING COMPANY LIMITED (01313782) — owns 75–100% of shares; holds 75–100% of voting rights
- E.On Se — owns 75–100% of shares; holds 75–100% of voting rights
OVO Energy
Parties named, none at controlling levelUK private company · Supplier
OVO GROUP LTD — company 10722770, active, incorporated April 2017
Other entities in the group (4)
- OVO ENERGY LTD (06890795) — Licensed retail supply company
- ENERGY TRANSITION FINANCE LTD (10722665) — Intermediate holding company (formerly OVO Holdings Ltd)
- ENERGY TRANSITION GROUP LTD (08862063) — Intermediate holding company (formerly OVO Group Ltd)
- ENERGY TRANSITION HOLDINGS LTD (14443869) — Top UK holding company (chain terminus)
Who controls it, as the register states
- ENERGY TRANSITION FINANCE LTD (10722665) — owns 75–100% of shares; holds 75–100% of voting rights; can appoint and remove directors
- ENERGY TRANSITION GROUP LTD (08862063) — owns 75–100% of shares; holds 75–100% of voting rights; can appoint and remove directors
- ENERGY TRANSITION HOLDINGS LTD (14443869) — owns 75–100% of shares; holds 75–100% of voting rights
- Mr Stephen Fitzpatrick — owns 25–50% of shares; holds 25–50% of voting rights
Octopus Energy
No controlling party on the registerUK private company · Supplier · Generator
OCTOPUS ENERGY GROUP LIMITED — company 09718624, active, incorporated August 2015
Other entities in the group (4)
- OCTOPUS ENERGY LIMITED (09263424) — Licensed retail supply company
- OCTOPUS ENERGY TOPCO LIMITED (16982052) — Intermediate holding company (inserted above the group in 2026)
- OCTOPUS ENERGY HOLDCO LIMITED (09718990) — Intermediate holding company
- OE HOLDCO LTD (14005495) — Top UK holding company (chain terminus)
Who controls it, as the register states
- OCTOPUS ENERGY TOPCO LIMITED (16982052) — owns 75–100% of shares; holds 75–100% of voting rights; can appoint and remove directors
- OCTOPUS ENERGY HOLDCO LIMITED (09718990) — owns 25–50% of shares; holds 25–50% of voting rights
- OE HOLDCO LTD (14005495) — owns 75–100% of shares; holds 75–100% of voting rights; can appoint and remove directors
ScottishPower (Iberdrola)
Controlling parent named on the registerUK subsidiary of a foreign parent · Supplier · Generator · Network operator · Vertically integrated
SCOTTISH POWER LIMITED — company SC193794, active, incorporated February 1999, registered in Scotland
Other entities in the group (2)
- SCOTTISHPOWER ENERGY RETAIL LIMITED (SC190287) — Licensed retail supply company
- SPW INVESTMENTS LIMITED (SC473190) — Top UK holding company (formerly Iberdrola UK Limited)
Who controls it, as the register states
- SPW INVESTMENTS LIMITED (SC473190) — owns 75–100% of shares; holds 75–100% of voting rights; can appoint and remove directors
- Iberdrola Sa — owns 75–100% of shares; holds 75–100% of voting rights; can appoint and remove directors
SSE
No controlling party on the registerUK-listed plc · Generator · Network operator
SSE PLC — company SC117119, active, incorporated April 1989, registered in Scotland
Other entities in the group (1)
- SSE ENERGY SUPPLY LIMITED (03757502) — Electricity supply company; SSE plc is its active PSC
The register does not say. Companies whose voting shares are admitted to trading on a UK regulated market are outside the Part 21A PSC regime. Their large shareholders are disclosed through DTR 5 major-shareholding notifications, not through Companies House. An empty PSC register for a listed plc therefore means "the regime does not apply", not "nobody owns it" — and the two must never be reported the same way.
Drax
No controlling party on the registerUK-listed plc · Generator
DRAX GROUP PLC — company 05562053, active, incorporated September 2005
The register does not say. Companies whose voting shares are admitted to trading on a UK regulated market are outside the Part 21A PSC regime. Their large shareholders are disclosed through DTR 5 major-shareholding notifications, not through Companies House. An empty PSC register for a listed plc therefore means "the regime does not apply", not "nobody owns it" — and the two must never be reported the same way.
National Grid
No controlling party on the registerUK-listed plc · Network operator
NATIONAL GRID PLC — company 04031152, active, incorporated July 2000
Other entities in the group (2)
- NATIONAL GRID ELECTRICITY TRANSMISSION PLC (02366977) — Electricity transmission licensee (England & Wales)
- NATIONAL GRID ELECTRICITY DISTRIBUTION PLC (09223384) — Electricity distribution licensee
The register does not say. Companies whose voting shares are admitted to trading on a UK regulated market are outside the Part 21A PSC regime. Their large shareholders are disclosed through DTR 5 major-shareholding notifications, not through Companies House. An empty PSC register for a listed plc therefore means "the regime does not apply", not "nobody owns it" — and the two must never be reported the same way.
4. Why the register goes quiet in three different ways
An empty ownership record does not mean nobody owns the company. One of these applies, and they are not the same thing.
Listed companies are exempt by law
Companies whose voting shares are admitted to trading on a UK regulated market are outside the Part 21A PSC regime. Their large shareholders are disclosed through DTR 5 major-shareholding notifications, not through Companies House. An empty PSC register for a listed plc therefore means "the regime does not apply", not "nobody owns it" — and the two must never be reported the same way.
A foreign parent can sit outside the UK register entirely
The UK PSC register does not connect EDF’s UK group to Électricité de France SA or to the French state. EDF Energy (UK) Limited (02622406) has filed a formal "no individual or entity with significant control" statement, and the chain ends there. Any claim about French state ownership must be sourced elsewhere and must not be attributed to Companies House.
Some questions the register does not settle
SSE Energy Supply Limited (03757502) remains an SSE plc subsidiary on the PSC register, despite SSE’s 2020 sale of its household supply business to OVO. This dataset places it where the register does — under SSE — and makes no claim about which entities that transaction moved. Whether SSE still supplies households must be sourced from Ofgem’s licensee register or SSE’s own reporting, not from Companies House.
5. What the listed groups report
These are group-wide statutory results from audited accounts — everything each company does, everywhere — not its UK energy business, and not the “adjusted” figures companies tend to headline. Centrica’s statutory revenue for 2025 was £19.5bn, for example, while the adjusted figure presented alongside it was £22.4bn. Year ends differ: Centrica and Drax report to December, National Grid and SSE to March.
| Company | Year | Revenue | Operating profit | Profit before tax |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Centrica (British Gas) | 2025 | £19.5bn | £0.1bn | £0.1bn |
| National Grid | 2025/26 | £17.7bn | £5.4bn | £4.2bn |
| SSE | 2025/26 | £10.2bn | £1.9bn | £1.8bn |
| Drax Group | 2025 | £5.4bn | £0.2bn | £0.2bn |
Source: each company’s audited annual report, retrieved as machine-tagged filings from the FCA’s National Storage Mechanism. Audited accounts filed under a legal duty, but a company reporting on itself — not an official statistic. Where a company later restated a comparative, the figure is kept as first reported.
Why only four companies, and no executive pay
Statutory group financials are published for the four UK-listed groups (Centrica, National Grid, SSE, Drax), because UK-listed issuers must file machine-tagged annual reports. They are GROUP-WORLDWIDE figures, not UK figures — a group revenue line includes everything the company does everywhere. The other five have no equivalent: E.ON UK, EDF’s UK group, ScottishPower, Octopus and OVO are not UK-listed issuers and file nothing comparable, and they never will under this regime. Iberdrola publishes a UK column, but in euros on a Spanish group basis; Ofgem’s segmental statements are UK-scope and in sterling but arrive as dozens of supplier-hosted PDFs. So there is no single basis on which all nine can be compared, and none is asserted here.
Executive pay is not shown. Remuneration is published as formatted text rather than tagged figures, so it cannot be extracted reliably, and the Companies House register carries no pay data. A total that mixed salary, bonus, share awards and pension differently between companies would be worse than none.
Sources and methods (3)
- Companies House, persons with significant control register (released 28 August 2026) — company numbers, status and control relationships
- FCA, National Storage Mechanism — statutory annual results of the four listed groups
- GOV.UK, New publicly owned National Energy System Operator to pave the way to a clean energy future — system operator in public ownership from 1 October 2024
Method notes
- Companies are matched by what the register says about each company number, never by press reports of group transactions.