The successful bidders – Balfour Beatty, AmeyInabensa, CarillionPowerlines and ABC Electrification – will work with Network Rail to plan and deliver a range of schemes, which will see key routes in England, Wales and Scotland electrified for the first time.

CarillionPowerlines, a 70:30 joint venture between Carillion and Austrian-based SPL Powerlines, has been selected to deliver two of the six regional frameworks: Central (East Midlands Region) and Scotland and North East Region.

ABC Electrification, the alliance between Alstom, Babcock and Costain, also scored high picking up two regions on the network.

Balfour Beatty has won the Central Region (LNW North) of the national electrification programme in a deal expected to be worth more than £75m to the contractor.

This covers the design and installation of all electrification equipment for the Northern Hub electrification programme for routes between Manchester-Preston-Blackpool and Manchester-Stalybridge.

The appointment is a big boost to Balfour Beatty, which last month revealed it was pulling out of track renewals after failing to win a place on Network Rail’s preferred team.

Key electrification projects include: the Great Western and Midland main lines, Liverpool to Manchester and Preston, the Valley lines in south Wales and the ‘electric spine’ from Southampton docks to the West Midlands and Yorkshire.

Once complete more than half Britain’s rail network will be electrified with electric trains accounting for three-quarters of all traffic.

Simon Kirby, managing director of Network Rail’s infrastructure projects division, said: “Our work to electrify two thousand track miles represents the biggest programme of rail electrification in a generation.

“With billions of pounds set to be invested in electrification schemes over the next decade, and with many projects at different stages of development, it is absolutely vital that the supply market gets a clear, consistent message from Network Rail about what the company needs from its supply partners, where and when.

“The framework approach chosen by Network Rail gives suppliers a greater degree of certainty about the company’s pipeline of work and means suppliers can target investment so they have the right people with the right skills in the right parts of the country to deliver schemes which will improve our railway and boost economic growth.”