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Race Bank OFTO merger approval

By: Tom Russell 05/02/2019 EC

General Substations Windfarms

The European Commission has approved the acquisition of joint control over Diamond Transmission Partners RB Limited, the Offshore Transmission Owner (OFTO) for the Race Bank offshore wind farm.

Diamond Transmission Partners is a consortium comprising Mitsubishi Corporation and HICL Infrastructure Company Limited and agreed to enter a joint ownership agreement with Infrared Capital Partners Limited (IRCP). The Commission concluded that the proposed acquisition would raise no competition concerns, because the companies' activities do not overlap.

As the OFTO for the Race Bank offshore wind farm, Diamond Transmission Partners RB Limited is responsible for transmission of electricity from this wind farm to the UK's onshore National Electricity Transmission System.

The Race Bank wind farm, located 27km off the coast of Norfolk, consists of 91 6MW turbines and has a capacity of 573MW. It was fully commissioned in February 2018 and can produce enough power for over 500,000 UK homes.

The developer of the wind farm and the link is a consortium comprising Ørsted, Macquarie European Infrastructure Fund 5, Macquarie Capital, and Sumitomo Corporation.
Diamond Transmission Partners was originally selected by Ofgem through a tender process in which bidders compete to become Offshore Transmission Owners.

The links to the offshore wind farms are licences through a competitive regime which is run by Ofgem to tender to select the offshore transmission owner (OFTO) who will own and operate the transmission assets for a specified revenue period. For the fifth tender round, this revenue period is 20 years.

Last year Ofgem announced a sixth tender round of the OFTO regime for offshore wind farms in the UK. This round includes Hornsea Project One, Beatrice and East Anglia ONE.

Ofgem and the UK Government launched the OFTO regime in 2009. They claim at least £700m in savings were achieved for consumers across the first three tender rounds. Since 2009, winning bidders have so far invested more than £3.3bn in links and generation assets which have connected more than 5GW of offshore wind farms.

For more information on offshore wind farm grid connection systems, click here.

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Race Bank OFTO merger approval

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