Saudi wealth fund buys stake in offshore wind developer with eyes on Australia

The recently renamed and relaunched Skyborn Renewables, which has plans to develop three offshore wind farms in Australia, has received another boost this week after Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund acquired a 9.5% stake in the company.

WPD Offshore was relaunched in September as Skyborn Renewables, claiming to have the world’s largest offshore wind pipeline, after Global Infrastructure Partners (GIP) bought the company from German wind and solar developer WPD.

The Emirati state-owned Mubadala Investment Company then acquired a stake in Skyborn in late October from GIP, which included a 50% stake in GIP’s New York Bight project, the 1.6GW Bluepoint Wind.

Skyborn Renewables currently operates a portfolio with a capacity of more than 7GW, and a further five operating and under-construction projects in Germany, France, and Taiwan. All told, Skyborn Renewables boasts a 30GW pipeline of offshore wind projects at various stages of development.

Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF), is one of the largest sovereign wealth funds in the world, and says its purchase is to help the acceleration of energy transition and clean energy at an international scale.

“This investment opportunity enhances our objectives to increase our portfolio of investments in the low carbon sector, which now includes solar, power generation, electric vehicles and offshore wind energy,” said Turqi A. Alnowaiser, deputy governor and head of the International Investments Division at PIF.

“Offshore wind has a key role to play in driving global decarbonization and we see significant growth opportunities for Skyborn.”

Skyborn Renewables is looking to expand the size of the three offshore wind farms it is planning to develop with the UK-based Australis Energy in Victoria, South Australia, and Western Australia.

The first priority is the Cape Winds offshore project proposed for construction off the coast of Discovery Bay in south-west Victoria. Originally planned with a capacity of 400MW, the potential size has grown five-fold to around 2GW.

Skyborn is also lifting the potential capacity of its renamed Myalup offshore wind project in Western Australia from 300MW to 1.9GW. Meanwhile, Skyborn has also renamed its 600MW South Australia project to Kingston.