Ofgem has shortlisted bidders competing to own and operate transmission links to the 402MW Dudgeon, 400MW Rampion and 573MW Race Bank offshore wind farms off the coasts of Norfolk and Sussex.
Balfour Beatty Investments, Equitix, Diamond Transmission Partners (a consortium of Mitsubishi Corp and HICL) and Transmission Capital Partners are in the running for all three links.
Mari Energy Transmission – a consortium of Macquarie Capital Group and Frontier Power – is shortlisted for Dudgeon and Rampion and Triton Transmission, a consortium of Dalmore Capital and DIF Infra 4 UK, for Race Bank.
The three links are the first of five to be tendered under the fifth round of the offshore transmission owner (OFTO) regime.
The bidders will now go through to the final invitation to tender (ITT) stage.
Ofgem said it will announce the details of the preferred bidder for each project at the completion of each ITT evaluation stage.
The successful OFTOs will receive a guaranteed revenue stream for 20 years under the terms of the licences awarded, subject to the availability of the assets, the UK energy regulator said.
The fifth round, which also includes the 336MW Galloper and the 660MW Walney 3 projects, has an estimated value of £2bn and will connect 2.3GW of generation capacity.
Image: reNEWS
