China Three Gorges Corporation and China Guodian Corporation have placed bids to buy Blackstone Group LP’s share in the 288MW Meerwind Süd/Ost offshore wind farm situated in the German part of the North Sea, Bloomberg quoted sources familiar with the matter as saying.
The wind farm is owned and operated by WindMW GmbH, which in turn is owned by Blackstone (80%) and Windland Energieerzeugungs GmbH (20%).
The two Chinese companies are reported to have entered the second round to sell the Meerwind wind farm, valued at around EUR 1.6 billion. Other competitors in the bidding process identified by one of Bloomberg’s anonymous sources are Borealis Infrastructure and MEAG, part of Munich Re Group, among others.
The next round of bids is scheduled for April.
The move is seen as part of an earlier decision by Chinese companies to invest over USD 77 billion in projects outside China to tackle slowing economic growth in the country. In 2015, China recorded a 6.9% economic growth, the lowest in the last 25 years.
The Meerwind offshore wind farm is located in the German North Sea to the south-west of the Danish-German border. It consists of 80 Siemens 3.6MW wind turbines and has been operational since January 2015.
Offshore WIND Staff