Scottish energy company SSE has sold 25% stake in its 108MW Cloosh Valley Wind Farm, part of the 174MW Galway Wind Park to the co-owner, Greencoat Renewables for €34.5m.

SSE

Image: SSE sells take in 108MW wind farm to Greencoat Renewables. Photo: Courtesy of SSE.

Prior to the sale, SSE and Greencoat Renewables both held 50% stake in the Cloosh Valley Wind Farm. With the stake sale, SSE has become a minority owner and Greencoat holds a majority of 75% stake in the wind farm. The present stake sale equates to 27MW.

SSE will continue operating the wind farm and its Irish subsidiary SSE Airtricity will continue to have the offtake of the electricity generated from the wind farm.

SSE finance director Gregor Alexander said: “Galway Wind Park is a testament to SSE’s ability to design, develop, construct and operate first class renewable energy assets. Onshore wind makes a huge contribution to supplying low carbon electricity to Ireland’s all-island energy market and to meeting the country’s carbon reduction targets.

“The sale of this stake in Cloosh Valley Wind Farm to our site co-owner Greencoat Renewables is a continuation of SSE’s longstanding approach of partnering with other renewable investors and securing value for shareholders at appropriate times.”

Cloosh Valley Wind Farm is powered by 36 of Siemens’ turbines each with 3MW of capacity. It is located in Connemara’s Cloosh Valley in Ireland. The site is contracted under Ireland’s REFIT 2 support regime until 2032 and project finance was put in place in December 2015.

Commercial operations of the Galway Wind Park began in September 2017. The wind farm is powered by 58 turbines in total, making it one of the largest wind farms in the Ireland. It was developed in two phases. Phase I included 66MW and is fully-owned by SSE. The Phase II Cloosh Valley Wind Farm has a capacity of 108MW, which is the subject of the present transaction.

After selling the stake, SSE will now own 93MW of installed capacity in the Galway Wind Park, representing a 53% ownership share of the total site.

Greencoat Capital partner Paul O’Donnell said: “We are very pleased to partner with SSE and to strengthen our relationship as co-owners of this asset at Ireland’s largest wind farm. We continue to see a strong pipeline of acquisition opportunities, for which our track record in execution and operations makes us an attractive partner for utilities looking to recycle capital.”