Augusta & Co PLC (“Augusta”) acted as exclusive financial advisor to PNE WIND AG (“PNE”) on the sale of its 584MW Gode Wind I and II offshore wind projects (“Gode Wind”) in the North Sea to DONG Energy A/S (“Dong”).
PNE is one of Germany’s largest on- and offshore wind farm project developers having permitted 4 offshore North Sea projects alone and having installed some 800MW onshore in various countries in Europe, Canada and the US.
In order to make the transaction attractive to Dong a significant reorganisation of these late stage offshore projects had to be undertaken during a competitive sales process.
As part of the deal and due to the reorganisation undertaken with BSH, Bundesnetzagentur and TenneT, Dong is able to increase the size of the projects, construct in different phases and increase the planned turbine size all while retaining the grid connection guarantees.
In addition Dong has the option to purchase Gode Wind III, a 90MW extension project to Gode Wind II which would lift the total MW to be built to 926 in all.
Augusta believes this is the first time in German offshore wind that such a reorganisation with Bundesnetzagentur/TenneT of a late stage offshore project has been achieved.
Mortimer Menzel who led the transaction at Augusta commented:
“We were thrilled to be acting for PNE Wind on this landmark offshore deal. It is the largest transaction in the history of PNE, the largest offshore transaction in Germany to date and also the largest ever European offshore wind transaction measured by permitted and grid connected assets (584MW in total). We also believe it is a first in terms of the degree of restructuring of an already advanced project. It shows what can be done”
The transaction closed in December 2012.