Masdar to invest £525m in UK offshore wind farm project

Abu Dhabi-based Masdar is set to invest £525m in 402MW Dudgeon offshore wind farm project, which is located off the Norfolk coast in the UK.

In the proposed project, Masdar will acquire 35% stake from Norway’s Statoil, which leaves the latter with 35% equity. The remaining 30% stake is retained by Statkraft.

Expected to create 450 jobs and spur the UK’s economy with hundreds of millions of pounds of investment, the wind farm is expected to generate power for approximately 410,000 homes.

Construction on the project will commence in 2016 and is expected to be completed by late 2017.

Earlier in the year, Siemens secured two contracts, worth £516m to provide engineering, supply, assembly, commissioning and service of Dudgeon’s 67 wind turbine generators.

UK Energy and Climate Change Secretary Ed Davey said: "Masdar’s investment is a strong endorsement of the UK as the best place in the world to invest in offshore wind – and it shows the Government’s plan for green growth is working.

"Since 2010 we have seen, on average, £7 billion a year invested in renewables and we expect to see up to £50 billion more between now and 2020."

Masdar chairman Sultan Al Jaber said: "As the only OPEC nation supplying both traditional and renewable energy to international markets, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) is committed to accelerating the use of wind energy as an effective means of balancing the global energy mix as we move toward a sustainable, low carbon future."

In October 2012, Statoil and Statkraft acquired the Dudgeon Offshore Wind Farm project through the acquisition of all the shares of Dudgeon Offshore Wind, which is a subsidiary of UK’s Warwick Energy.

In early July, developers of the project announced intention to invest £1.5bn into offshore wind project.

The Dudgeon project is an addition to Masdar’s wide portfolio of clean energy projects, which includes the 100MW Shams 1 in the UAE and the 117MW Tafila wind farm in Jordan. The firm also invested in London Array project, another UK offshore wind farm.