As they prepare to make their bid for two offshore wind farm sites in France, Iberdrola, the parent company of ScottishPower, specialists in business electricity recently made the announcement they have welcomed EOLE-RES into their consortium to aid in making their bid. EOLE-RES hare renowned for their innovation in the design, development, construction and overall operation of multiple successful projects focusing on renewable energy. With this addition, the already strong line up of experienced organization bidding for these wind farms continues to build momentum.
From the onset, Iberdrola has already partnered with AREVA in effort to have them provide the wind turbines for this wind powerr project. Overall, the goal of the French government to hit its target of reaching 6 GW by 2020 will be bolstered by 1.25 GW with AREVA’s turbines in place. In addition, the world’s leader in this sort of project management, engineering and construction throughout the energy industry, Technip, has also joined forces with these companies in August to secure the construction and engineering projects met both timelines and budgets.
Another benefit to Iberdrola bringing EOLE-RES in to this consortium is that they will also bring in their sister company RES Offshore. Although EOLE-RES is one of France’s leading wind energy developers, their sister company RES Offshore specializes in additional development, technology and engineering know-how. This additional and specific expertise will only continue to strengthen the partnership already in place with this consortium. Furthermore, RES Offshore has already proven their abilities by currently providing over 5000MW in development through the United States(US) and Europe and an additional 350MW to the United Kingdom(UK [FREE Stock Trend Analysis]) alone.
In addition to the proven power already being provided, this consortium also has bids to potentially provide an additional 750MW to the Saint-Nazaire zone off the Atlantic Coast and another 500MW to the Saint-Brieuc zone in Northern Brittany. The French Government has plans to name their successful bidders for these projects in April 2012. This will be a short four months after bids are due to the French Government in January 2012.
Keith Anderson who is the Chief Executive of both ScottishPower Renewables as well as Iberdrola’s Glasgow-based Global Offshore Division stated, “EOLE-RES is a very strong addition to the consortium, with a wealth of experience in delivering onshore wind farm projects in France as well as working on offshore projects.”
Anderson continued by saying, “Together with AREVA and Technip, we have established a consortium with a wealth of experience in delivering successful renewable energy projects across Europe and are confident that we can submit a strong bid. All partners will work closely together on the bids and a project team has been established in France. The consortium aims to create significant industrial opportunities if it is successful in the tender process and will provide French industrial companies with additional opportunities to access the global offshore arena.”
CEO of EOLE-RES, Jean-Marc Armitano also added, “This partnership combines the valuable experience and unrivalled expertise of the two groups in terms of design and construction of both onshore and offshore wind farms. This consortium is undoubtedly one of the most solid and experienced, with a valuable technical, industrial and financial background that will allow the development of high-quality offshore projects.”
Although primarily in the UK, their pipeline of approximately 10000MW in offshore wind power projects makes Iberdrola the largest wind energy company on the planet. When EOLE-RES is added into this consortium as one of France’s leading wind energy developers driven by their specialization they possess in the overall process of creating, building and operating wind energy facilities, it grows the strength of this consortium almost exponentially. France has already received over 400MW from this group that has designs on providing thousands more. With proven success over the past decade of already providing high-quality wind energy to the French, the aspect of continued success on a larger scale is definitely an exciting one.
