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Ameresco, Inc. announced that it has begun commercial operations at the Beale Hill Wind Farm in County Kerry, Ireland. This is the first wind power project owned and operated by Ameresco and the company’s first renewable generation asset outside of the United States and Canada.
Ameresco acquired the Beale Hill Wind Farm from Irish electric company, First Electric and completed a number of upgrades including nacelle, generator and rotor arm replacements. The project has been developed exclusively by Ameresco and is not reliant on any form of subsidy from the Irish Government in the form of tariffs or consumer levies helping to provide citizens in the surrounding community with carbon-free energy. The electricity generated at Beale Hill will be sold directly into the local utility network under a power purchase agreement.
Ameresco Executive Vice President and Director David J. Anderson commented that, this landmark project is both an extension of their company’s geographic footprint and strategic expansion of the renewable energy asset portfolio. He also added that Ameresco’s North American based renewable energy assets stand at 255 MW and still counting. With the Beale Hill project the company paves the way to develop additional wind power projects in the future. This project is an important milestone in supporting Ameresco’s long-term strategy to expand its portfolio of renewable generation and energy storage assets on an international scale.
It was very satisfying to get the project over the line, said Derek Dixon, Chief Executive of Ameresco Limited. He proudly added that , the latter stages of construction, commissioning and energization were completed amid a plethora of obstacles, including more recently the COVID-19 pandemic. The company is grateful to their in-house team for all that they did to successfully complete this landmark project and for the support and advice provided by their Irish legal advisors LK Shields and subcontract partner Bettink.
