Octopus Renewables Infrastructure Trust (ORIT) has agreed to conditionally acquire a 32.6 MW Sun Site in Ireland for around € 27 million (£ 23.13 million).
Orit will complete the purchase for the entire cash total after the Solar site has completed the operational tests. It will soon start construction and it is expected to be operational in the second half of 2026.
It will be the sixth project in the Operational Ballymacarney complex that is already owned by Orit, which is part of the Octopus Energy Group. The extra site, called Irishtown, will increase the total complex capacity to 274 MW, an increase of 14%.
This acquisition is in line with the indicated capital allocation policy of ORIT, to make selected accretive investments as part of the current capital recycling program.
Statkraft develops the Irishtown site, just like the rest of the Ballymacarney complex. Irishtown will share the existing grid infrastructure used by the rest of the site.
Orit stated that it has concluded a Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) for the site with an American technology company, that Orit’s chairman Phil Austin said: “Fits well with the established Strategy of Orit to decouples portfolio-cash flows by protecting fixed income in the long term”.
Austin said: “We remain acutely focused on disciplined capitulation allocation and have been clear that new acquisitions will only be done if there is a mandatory matter to do this. This forward purchase reflects the possibility of expanding our presence at Ballymacarney in a cost -efficient way with the existing infrastructure of the site.”
Orit completed the acquisition of the fifth solar site in Ballymacarney in October last year, making the then complex the largest in Ireland by five years, of which Orit claimed that it would achieve approximately 2.5% of 8GW’s Irish National Solar Doel by 2030.
The investor signed one Five -year term Loan facility worth £ 100 million Earlier this year, consisting of equal obligations of existing investors Santander, National Australia Bank and Allied Irish Banks and is protected against the British wind and solar activa of Orit.
While the PPA signer is not further mentioned for the Irishtown site, the other five sites of a 15-year-old PPA with Microsoft benefit.
The technology giant has an established interest in the state of Ireland, because the nation is a global hotspot for data center developments.
As reported on our sister site, Power ±figures from the Central Statistics Office for Ireland showed that In 2023, data centers took 21% of the total measured electricity consumptionMore than the total amount for urban homes (18%) and for rural homes (10%).
