Energia will be the biggest purchaser of the renewable energy produced by Ireland’s growing number of wind farms in 2011, according to new figures from the Irish Wind Energy Association. Responding to the massive increase in demand from Irish businesses for ‘green’ power, Energia is set to grow its renewable energy portfolio by over 268 megawatts (MWs) this year.
The vast majority of this, 243 MW, will come from 26 new Irish windfarms that will become operational during 2011. This equates to 68% of the total new electricity generated by Ireland’s wind farms this year, making Energia by far the largest purchaser of new Irish wind farm power.
Last year 115 MWs of new generating capacity from Irish wind farms was connected to the national grid, over 40%of which is in Energia’s portfolio. In 2011 this figure is set to rise to around 400MWs.
Peter Baillie, managing director of Energia Renewables, comments: “In response to the growing number of Irish businesses asking for green power, Energia’s renewable power portofolio is set to grow by 268 megawatts (MW) this year. 25MWs will come from our Energia wind farms and 243 MWs will come from new wind farms all over Ireland. This makes us by far the biggest purchaser of new wind power capacity in Ireland.”
He continues: “We have signed a large number of power purchase agreements (PPAs) with new wind farm developments all over Ireland, including locations in counties Carlow, Cork, Donegal, Kerry, Leitrim, Limerick, Mayo, Roscommon, Tipperary and Wexford.”
In addition to these PPAs, Energia already runs a large number of its own wind farms throughout Ireland in locations such as Donegal, Roscommon and Sligo. The company is also in the final stages of developing new wind farms in Caherdowney, County Cork, Meenadreen. County Donegal, and Hollyford, County Tipperary.
“We also recently raised a Eur72 million in financing for our latest group of renewable projects, bringing our total wind farm financing to Eur115m in the last two years,” he point out. “At the moment we are very focused on expanding our renewables business.”