Irish solar project developer Shannon Energy and Danish peer Obton plan to deploy 500 MW of large scale PV capacity in Ireland over the next five years. The companies say they will invest more than €300 million in the projects through a joint venture formed in 2018.
The pipeline will kick off with the development and construction of three solar portfolios – comprised of six PV projects with a combined generation capacity of 150 MW – which the companies recently acquired.
There are three plants in the first collection, in the eastern counties of Westmeath and Longford, in Leinster province and in Tipperary, in Munster province in the southeast of Ireland. A second portfolio consists of another project in Tipperary plus one in County Cork, also in Munster, and the third acquisition is a single project planned in the province of Connacht, County Galway, in the west of Ireland.
Five-year plan
“We look forward to securing the licences for our planned implementation in the upcoming Renewable Electricity Support Scheme (RESS) auctions over the next five years,” said Shannon Energy CEO Noel Shannon.
The RESS was finally introduced by the Irish government at the end of last year. The first, RESS 1 procurement exercise is expected soon, with around 1 TWh of renewable energy to be generated by the facilities commissioned.
Numerous already-developed solar projects may compete in the auction. In October, Norwegian hydropower and energy company Statkraft revealed in its third-quarter update it had acquired a portfolio of PV projects in Ireland with a combined generation capacity of 326 MW.
