Leading international downstream solar group Conergy announced on Wednesday plans to further integrate Wirsol Solar UK in an effort to create one of the United Kingdom's five biggest companies in the engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) of large solar plants.
Conergy acquired Wirsol Solar UK in January following the insolvency of German parent group Wirsol. Other major Wirsol assets went to German renewable energy group Wircon.
Wirsol Solar UK, which built the 1.15 MWp solar rooftop array at the Jaguar Land Rover plant in Coventry and acquired the rights to 166 MW in projects from Lumicity in July, will now be known as Conergy West Sussex Ltd.
Robert Goss, managing director of Conergy UK & Ireland since 2011, has taken over managing director responsibilities at the new subsidiary from outgoing Wirsol Solar UK Managing Director Mark Hogan. (Hogan remains president of Wirsol Energy Ltd., a subsidiary of German group Wircon, which took over Wirsol's other major solar development assets in March.) Sascha Klos and Daniel Kirk will remain on board at Conergy West Susses as directors.
With the U.K. forecasted to retain its position as Europe's biggest solar market in 2015, Conergy West Sussex will focus on the development of large free-field projects, from the securing of land and planning permission to building and sales, while Conergy UK & Ireland will focus on finance, EPC and operations and maintenance (O&M) in the large-scale market.
The companies have secured a $60 million bank guarantee facility arranged by Deutsche Bank and financed by Tennenbaum Capital Partners to support a 400 MW expansion of the Conergy group's international projects business.
"Buying Wirsol was not just about adding to our solar farm pipeline," Goss said. "What we were looking for was to add to our experience, network and reach, and to prepare for the next phase of British solar, which is just starting to take shape. Wirsol has strengths in project development and large rooftops that we wanted and is already proving an excellent fit."
Conergy will maintain two offices in the country, at Milton Keynes, where its U.K. headquarters is based, and at Wirsol Solar UK's former offices in Pulborough, West Sussex, in the south of the country, where the majority of large-scale projects are developed.
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