Work on a £1million upgrade to power infrastructure in one of our key towns has been completed.

UK Power Networks, the country's biggest electricity distributor, has carried out the work in Sittingbourne.

It installed new equipment at the town’s electricity substation.

It forms part of the firm's £600m investment programme for 2019, nationwide.

Tony Rogers, capital programme manager at UK Power Networks, said: “We have invested in the renewal of important equipment at the substation to ensure safe and reliable power supplies for the thousands of homes and businesses that we serve across Sittingbourne.

“The new transformer – a device which steps down the voltage so power can be safely delivered locally – will increase the capacity of the substation to meet the area’s growing demand for power and increase the flexibility of our network. It represents a significant investment to benefit our customers and is one of a number of projects we will carry out across the south east this year to maintain resilient electricity supplies.”

The 58-tonne transformer was delivered to the Borden area of Sittingbourne in the summer and a 500-tonne crane lifted it into position. Since then work has been progressing behind the scenes to connect it to the electricity network.

The site receives electricity from the national grid at 132,000-volts and the transformer that has recently started work, steps it down to 33,000-volts to be delivered to smaller local substations to serve individual homes and businesses.