In regulated infrastructure, value is not a fixed concept. The value of an infrastructure asset depends on how it is measured and which accounting basis drives returns. Different accounting frameworks produce markedly different views of the same asset base. Regulatory asset values (RAV), historical cost accounts, and current cost accounts (modern equivalent asset value, MEAV, or replacement cost), each serve distinct purposes. But when the differences between these measures changes,...

Infrastructure debates tend to focus on what should be built next. Yet a more fundamental question sits beneath them: how quickly should we pay for what has already been built? That question goes to the heart of depreciation. As discussions at the March roundtable underscored, it is emerging as a central lever in infrastructure economics and regulation. How does intergenerational fairness impact affordability? Depreciation directly shapes returns, bill trajectories, and risk allocation over...

Measuring the crowding-out effect and what it takes to bring private capital back to “slow” infrastructure in the UK

Projects today face a widening set of power-related uncertainties: delayed grid connections, congestion that limits deliverability, curtailment during peak hours, tightening capacity margins, and growing political scrutiny over who pays for system upgrades.

The data‑centre pipeline dominating electricity forecasts is not a construction schedule. It is a set of possibilities. Developers submit multiple applications across regions and substations, knowing that only a small share will ever be built.

Affordability does not constrain infrastructure investment directly. It acts through politics and regulation. As utility bills rise faster than incomes, tolerance for further increases falls, raising the risk of political intervention in allowed returns and cost recovery. For long-lived, capital-intensive assets, this uncertainty lifts required returns, turning affordability into a material cost of equity risk.