The £160m Margam Green Energy Plant has started generating renewable electricity adequate to power approximately 75,000 homes in South Wales
Image: Cardiff Energy Company’s Eco2 has led the construction management for the power station. Photo courtesy of Michal Křenovský from Pixabay.
European large-scale renewable energy fund managers Glennmont Partners has announced the start of commercial operations at Margam Green Energy Plant, located 4.8km south-east of Port Talbot in south Wales.
The consortium of Babcock & Wilcox Vølund (B&W) and Interserve Construction, the primary contractor for the Margam power project, has formally handed it over to Glennmont Partners.
The £160m Margam renewable energy plant is fuelled by waste wood
Stobart Biomass Products has been signed a long-term, indexed-linked fuel supply contract, to supply fuel for the plant, sourced from the waste wood market.
In January 2015, the Glennmont Partners’ clean energy fund, Glennmont Clean Energy Fund Europe II, bought the Margam Green Energy Project from ECO2 and Western Logs Group.
The purchase and construction of the Margam project was supported by Deutsche Bank through debt arrangement, with the support of Eksport Kredit Fonden, the export credit agency of Denmark.
In 2016, the construction of the Margam plant started employing more than 400 people on site.
Glennmont Partners said that the B&W and Interserve worked in partnership with a large number of sub-contractors from Wales and other parts of the UK and continental Europe.
Cardiff Energy Company’s Eco2 has led the construction management for the power station and now has management responsibility for Margam’s commercial operation, along with responsibility for Margam’s waste wood fuel logistics.
Glennmont partner Peter Dickson said: “We are very pleased to see Margam fired-up and generating renewable energy for homes and businesses in south Wales. Margam is a long-term investment in Wales’s energy infrastructure.
“Glennmont has appreciated the hard work of everyone to complete Margam’s construction: the efforts of B&W, Interserve, Eco2 and in particular the commitment shown by so many individual workers on site. We have had challenges along the way but I’m delighted to have reached this moment: seeing Margam generating renewable electricity into the grid.”