CIP Targets More Offshore Wind with New Investment Fund

Danish fund management company Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (CIP) has initiated the fundraising process for its new fund, Copenhagen Infrastructure III K/S, which has already received commitment of DKK 8.8 billion (around 1.2bn EUR).

“Copenhagen Infrastructure III will have the same focus as CIP’s previous funds, being investments in energy infrastructure with stable returns, including onshore and offshore wind, solar PV, biomass fired power plants, transmission grid systems, etc. The energy infrastructure market currently shows an attractive growth due to the strong commercial breakthrough recently in several renewable energy technologies,” said Christian Skakkebæk, Senior Partner in CIP.

The fundraising follows the recent investment of the EUR 2bn commitment to Copenhagen Infrastructure II, which has been invested in 10 energy infrastructure projects. Copenhagen Infrastructure II had its final closing in June 2015.

The primary geographical scope of the fund is Northern and Western Europe as well as North America. The fund is a 20-year “build-and-hold” fund, which means that the fund focus on greenfield investments and as a base case expects to hold the investments throughout the entire commercial lifetime of the assets.

CIP currently has three funds under management with a total commitment of around DKK 25bn (EUR 3.3bn). The fund management company has so far invested into three offshore wind projects in Europe, including EUR 384 million for TenneT’s 900MW DolWin3 offshore transmission platform, and EUR 250 million for the 402MW Veja Mate offshore wind farm. CIP also controls a 25% stake in the 588MW Beatrice offshore wind farm in Scotland.

In North America, CIP last year entered into partnership with the Canadian-based developer Beothuk Energy to develop the 180MW St. George’s Bay project off the coast of Newfoundland.

In August 2016, CIP bought a 100% stake in Offshore MW LLC, a company holding a 166,886 acre (675 square km) offshore wind energy lease located south of Massachusetts.