Akuo Energy achieved financial closure with equity partnership from Mirova Eurofideme 4 and loans from BNP Paribas Bank Polska, Commerzbank and Poland’s mBank
Image: Akuo Energy selects Vestas to supply turbines for Polish wind farm. Photo: Courtesy of Courtesy of Vestas Wind Systems A/S.
French renewable energy company Akuo Energy announced that it has completed financing for three wind projects in Poland, totaling 132MW.
Financing of the projects was achieved through an equity partnership with Mirova Eurofideme 4 along with senior debt commercial loans from BNP Paribas Bank Polska, Commerzbank and Poland’s mBank.
The three wind projects will be powered by a total of 53 turbines to be supplied by Danish wind turbine-maker Vestas and will operated by Akuo’s local teams in Poland. Construction work has been contracted to the local subsidiary of Aldesa.
Developed over several years, the three projects had won the tender launched by the Polish Government in late last year.
As per Vestas, the three wind projects will include tailored solutions such as site-specific rotor sizes, ratings and hub heights that will cater for specific site and transportation constraints while maximising annual energy production.
The Wielowies project will feature 19 V136-3.45 MW turbines and one V126-3.45 MW turbine which will operate in 3.3MW.
The EP 44 project consists of 22 V110-2.0 MW turbines and the Gniew wind farm will include 11 V110-2.0 MW.
Akuo Energy CEO and co-founder Eric Scotto said: “This achievement is the result of AKUO’s continuous efforts to develop sustainable clean energy solutions in Poland for past years, and the result of a close cooperation with Vestas’ teams to implement site specific and cost optimised solutions despite current global high demand in the wind energy sector.
“We fully trust in Vestas’ capability to execute those projects within allocated the time schedule and budget, to make these projects a common new success in wind energy.”
The three wind farms could mitigate over 300,000 metric tons of CO2 emissions annually
The three projects are expected to be operational in 2021 and will generate clean energy that will be enough to power over 200,000 Polish homes, while avoiding more than 300,000 metric tonnes of CO2 emissions annually.
Vestas Northern & Central Europe president Nils de Baar said: “This order, from our valued, long-term partner Akuo Energy, once again underlines our ability to leverage our extensive expertise across the value chain to deliver a solution that ensures clean energy at the lowest cost of energy to the Polish energy consumers.
“We look forward to maximising our customer’s return on investment by offering a competitive cost of energy.”