Airtricity, the wind energy group, has re-entered the Irish energy market with plans to build four new wind farms using the proceeds of a €130 million fund-raising exercise.
The company had called a halt to developing Irish wind farms in January 2005, blaming lack of Government support for the sector. However chief executive Eddie O'Connor said yesterday that the Government had recently outlined a more supportive regime and Airtricity was reversing its decision.
The four wind farms will be built at Richfield, Co Wexford; Tournafulla, Co Limerick; Bindoo, Co Cavan and Knockastanna, Co Limerick. Airtricity is hopeful they will be operational within 18 months. All four are on land leased from local farmers and landowners. Planning permission has been secured, said a spokesman yesterday. Together the four wind farms will produce 110 megawatts.
The company said it needed to supply its 50,000 customers. To date it has been doing this via its existing group of wind farms, plus power imported through the north-south interconnector. But in recent times ESB and Viridian have outbid Airtricity for rights to this infrastructure and this has forced a rethink by the company.
The company has raised €130 million in non-equity finance, mainly arranged through Dolmen Securities, but this figure also includes some bank debt. Mr O'Connor said the company was valued at €349 million the last time a valuation exercise was done, but he expected a "significant uplift" the next time the exercise was performed. The group's shareholders include National Toll Roads, which has a 51 per cent stake, and the Quinn Group, which owns 13 per cent.
Mr O'Connor said while Government support for renewables had improved, there was no support for off-shore wind farms. He said this was "disastrous" and until there was a change, further development of the Arklow offshore wind farm was on hold.
Mr O'Connor and his colleague Mark Ennis, head of the company's supply division, said there was little prospect of the company entering the domestic market in a substantial way. Mr Evans said there was no "headroom" on prices in the domestic market because ESB was able to squeeze margins in this area and instead depend mainly on high profits from its distribution business. Mr Evans claimed Airtricity was just about breaking even on its Irish investments.
Mr O'Connor said the recent row over gas between Russia and Ukraine suggested the whole energy sector was "moving to a new paradigm", with China and India pushing demand along with the United States.
He said while the company had staff on the ground in China, it had not yet tackled that market in a major way. But he warned that if China and India needed additional power, Ireland would be ignored by the main global suppliers.
