National Grid U.K. Pension Scheme, Binfield, England insured £800 million ($1.1 billion) buy-in with Rothesay.
The buy-in relates to Section A of the electricity provider's plan, which has about £6 billion in assets, Mike Edwards, partner at Aon, said in an email. Aon advised the trustees and National Grid PLC on the deal. The trustees were also supported by the pension fund's in-house team.
The deal covers about 15% of Section A liabilities, he said. It follows a £2.8 billion buy-in with Rothesay in 2019, with about 60% of Section A's liabilities now insured, Mr. Edwards added.
Following the 2019 buy-in deal, Rothesay put in place a monitoring process to allow the pension fund to execute a buy-in for the latest set of liabilities as soon as market pricing and plan funding allowed, a Rothesay news release said.
"We are pleased that we could work with Rothesay and National Grid again to put in place a buy-in which is good for members and will provide long-term security for their pensions," Chris Hogg, CEO at the pension fund, said in the release.
"ESG and climate change is of paramount importance to the Trustee and is an important factor in our decision-making process," Mr Hogg said. "We look forward to working with Rothesay who share our commitment to achieving net-zero and supporting international agreements to limit future temperature increases to 1.5 (degrees) Celsius."
