GREEN CAT CONTRACTING: Laying the Groundwork for Clean Power
Every wind farm, solar site, and hydrogen plant begins in the ground. Civil engineering builds the platform long before turbines generate. General Manager Harry McGurnaghan tells Energy Focus how Green Cat Contracting is becoming a trusted name in onshore wind, solar and the emerging hydrogen industry.
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On a hillside at Glensaugh Farm in Aberdeenshire, a wind turbine stands above a working research farm, built to feed an electrolyser that splits water into hydrogen. Solar panels cover a shed roof nearby and battery storage waits close by. The 1.7km access track, the grid substation and the hydrogen compound were all built by Green Cat Contracting, the principal civil engineering contractor behind the project.
Based in Glasgow, the company specialises in design, civil engineering, and build balance of plant contracts for the renewable energy market. That means the roads, hardstandings, drainage, foundations, cabling and substations every site needs before a turbine can turn. Onshore wind farms of up to around 25MW and hydro schemes of up to around 1MW form the traditional core, alongside weir works, fish passes, pipelines and wider groundworks.
“The work has predominantly been on wind farms but there has also been some solar and hydro,” says General Manager Harry McGurnaghan. “Our core operation is facilitating civil engineering for developers who are looking to build efficient and economic renewable projects. We work mostly on the UK mainland but also cover the islands when that comes up. We handle the project from concept to operation.”
That reach draws strength from the group behind it. Green Cat Renewables, the consultancy Gavin Catto founded in 2005, stands alongside Green Cat Renewable Developments, an asset investment business, Green Cat Hydrogen and a major shareholding in Dutch turbine manufacturer EWT. More than 200 people work across the group. Catto established Green Cat Contracting in 2013 to build the projects his teams were conceiving. “We work closely with the other businesses in the Green Cat group, and we rely on them for various services that are embedded in those businesses including geotechnical, testing, design etc,” says McGurnaghan.
McGurnaghan joined in 2014, having studied civil engineering and completing his master’s studies at the University of Edinburgh. “I worked as an engineer for around 10 years working all over the UK on water and wastewater treatment plants which gave me a good civil engineering grounding,” he says. “I worked my way through that business before I moved to Green Cat Renewables which was a consultancy at the time.”
GROWING WITH INDUSTRY
Green Cat Contracting has grown up alongside UK onshore wind. Its portfolio includes the 17.5MW Hendy wind farm with seven Vestas turbines and Deuchries near Aberchirder, a project a previous owner had deemed unviable. “When we started, there were many small projects of small, single turbines, all over the UK – quite fast paced, relatively small value turnover. As the industry has matured, the sites become less in number but larger in project complexity and we have grown the business to suit that,” says McGurnaghan.
“We are in the multimillion-pound turnover bracket and we have 20 full-time people. Because we are spread geographically, we work closely with our supply chain and subcontractors. We go to site with a core team and then supplement that with local teams and plant,” says McGurnaghan. Client Cleanearth Energy has praised the company’s handling of a complex turbine project despite challenging ground conditions. Years of experience as well as a supply chain that is also well-versed in project development helps in sustainable delivery.
“We have a very wide and diverse supply chain and the basic building blocks include concrete, stone, and steel. They are the big-ticket items that feature on every wind farm and command the large spends,” says McGurnaghan. “Sometimes the kit is specialised, including transformers or switchgear or electrolysers. Often, there are only a few companies that make these vital pieces of equipment and ship them around the world.”
However, even with a team of the best, Britain’s grid has never carried so much renewable power. NESO reports that renewables produced a record 44% of electricity in 2025. Oxford University experts argue that managing wind’s variability will demand a complete overhaul of the National Grid. McGurnaghan sees the strain first hand. “The grid in the UK is extremely constrained and that is not limited to any geographical area, it’s a national issue. Projects stack up but the grid infrastructure is getting to the point where it is not able to cope. The approach is disjointed without a single body that retains control. That fractured nature means it is very difficult to fix issues – it is not a short-term thing.
“In the last five years, projects are becoming harder to build. There was a glut of work thanks to the feed-in tariffs, and government support made the industry explode,” says McGurnaghan. “Now, the tariffs are gone, government support is confusing, interest rates have risen, and big events like the Covid outbreak and the wars have made people more restrained in their spending. We are finding that projects are more difficult to come by, tenders are more difficult, margins are squeezed, and there’s been a reset.”
HYDROGEN IN PRACTICE
Thankfully, Green Cat Contracting is not tied solely to one power source. Hydrogen has arrived with fanfare and a fair share of hesitation, and the company is well positioned to support ambitious clients. The UK Hydrogen Strategy of 2021 set an ambition of 5GW of low carbon production capacity by 2030. The Hydrogen Allocation Rounds have since backed 11 projects in the first round and shortlisted 27 in the second, yet the Chemical Industries Association reports progress slower than expected. “There is a hydrogen boom that is coming – that is great, and we are already involved; however, I am nervous that it is not going to come as per the original national plan,” says McGurnaghan.
HydroGlen, at the James Hutton Institute’s Glensaugh research farm, received £6.2 million from the Scottish Government’s Just Transition Fund and is among the first UK projects to combine solar, wind, battery storage and green hydrogen in a farm-based microgrid. Green Cat Contracting won the design and build contract, working with electrical contractor Labron Technical and hydrogen specialists Hydrasun and Fuel Cell Systems. The scope includes a 77m tip height EWT DW54 turbine, the substation and a hydrogen compound housing electrolysers, storage and dispensers. Main construction is complete, and commissioning of the equipment and bespoke control system follows the grid connection.
“The turbine powers the electrolyser, spare energy is going to the batteries, when the wind doesn’t blow the battery kicks in, the solar provides back up, and the control system for that is unique,” says McGurnaghan. “The Institute is trying to demonstrate that hydrogen can be part of an off-grid solution that can work in a small rural setting. It doesn’t always have to be large scale, 10MW, £30 million projects. It might be that a £2 million investment on a rural site could allow an industrial farming operation to work carbon free.” Agriculture accounts for around 18% of Scotland’s greenhouse gas emissions, and HydroGlen’s modular design is intended to adapt to other farms.
In Stornoway, Green Cat Contracting is principal contractor on Creed, the Hydrogen Skills and Innovation Centre, for client PlusZero. The indoor facility will run an AEM electrolyser and an alkaline electrolyser with a combined maximum output of 150kg of hydrogen a day, partly powered by the existing turbine serving the local council’s waste management facility. Oxygen will be captured for the fisheries industry, and links to the University of the Highlands and Islands North, West & Hebrides campus in Stornoway will make the plant a working teaching facility.
“We are also working on the Creed Project, a hydrogen research facility,” says McGurnaghan. “It is a partnership project between our client, PlusZero, the Comhairle nan Eilean Siar, and UHI North, West & Hebrides and our role is to handle the civils while subcontracting in colleagues from Green Cat Renewables and Green Cat Hydrogen to help the client design and optimise the site. It is another project that, if it goes to plan, will be an early island project that produces hydrogen which could be very valuable for isolated rural communities who have their own grid issues.”
THE ROAD AHEAD
The project pipeline will remain diverse, and renewable energy is the golden thread that any growth is built around. “When Green Cat acquired EWT, the intention was to sell Dutch turbines to clients in the UK, giving a route to clients for Green Cat Contracting. Now, anyone who buys turbines from EWT that needs a site building will have a direct link to us. We won’t win every contract, but we can at least be part of the discussion,” says McGurnaghan. “It’s the same with the hydrogen consultancy business. They want to take sites and develop them ready for hydrogen construction, ready for hydrogen production.” Green Cat Hydrogen was shortlisted for three round two projects, more than any other Scottish-based developer.
Whichever technology leads the next chapter, it will need ground prepared for it. Onshore wind, solar, battery storage and hydrogen all depend on access roads, foundations, drainage, cable routes and secure compounds, and hydrogen adds pipelines and storage vessels to the list. The 2021 strategy suggested hydrogen could supply between 20 and 35% of UK final energy by 2050, and described it as fuel for boilers, turbines and engines alike. Every one of those installations begins with a civil contractor who understands live sites and difficult ground.
“We are starting to do small but unique things in the hydrogen space and we see that as new technology that is coming through – green hydrogen is renewable and we want to be known as a contractor that can handle that type of work. The civil engineering isn’t greatly different from other projects where we are experts – roads, hardstandings, drainage, utilities etc – and we can certainly deliver projects of this nature in hydrogen,” says McGurnaghan. “We have aimed to diversify so that we can spend half of our time on wind and half of hydrogen projects.”
Green Cat Contracting, backed by a group of more than 200 people, builds the infrastructure that turn renewable energy designs into working power and fuel. As technology inevitably changes, the industry will keep calling for that expertise.