TRIG pays £80m for first offshore wind farm investment

The purchase, including transaction costs, is the investment company's first in an offshore wind project. The investment is held in a new joint venture with funds managed by Equitix Ltd, which will own 25.3% of the wind farm.

Sheringham Shoal has 316.8MW of capacity and was originally developed by Statoil, which owns 40% of the project alongside Macquarie's Green Investment Group, which holds 20%. The site was commissioned in 2012 and has 88 Siemens 3.6MW turbines.

Helen Mahy, TRIG's chairman, said her company had been considering a wind-farm investment for the past few years. Sheringham Shoal is backed by experienced renewables investors and is the right project for a first step into the market, she said.

Mahy said: "The board of TRIG is delighted to conclude the company's first investment in offshore wind, an industry in which the UK has built a leading global market share and which is expected to contribute a significant proportion of the UK's renewable energy capacity build-out in the medium-term."

TRIG paid for the investment using the group's revolving acquisition facility, on which it has drawn £106m.