Ofgem grants Diamond Transmission Partners BBE Limited licence to own link to Burbo Bank Extension wind farm

Press release

Publication date

Industry sector

  • Supply and Retail Market
  • Offshore Transmission Network

Ofgem grants licence for Diamond Transmission Partners for the Burbo Bank Extension offshore windfarm grid link.

Ofgem has granted a licence to Diamond Transmission Partners BBE Limited (DTPBBE) to own and operate the £193.9m offshore transmission link to the 258MW Burbo Bank Extension windfarm in the Liverpool Bay.

Diamond Transmission Partners (DTP), a consortium comprising Mitsubishi Corporation and HICL Infrastructure Company Limited, was chosen by Ofgem through a tender process in which bidders compete to become offshore transmission owners (OFTOs). DTPBBE is the licensee entity incorporated by DTP in respect of the Burbo Bank Extension Project.

Since Ofgem and Government launched the OFTO scheme in 2009 winning bidders have so far invested a total of £3 billion in links and generation assets which have connected 4.6GW of offshore wind farms. 

A further £1.9 billion of links are being tendered to connect an additional 2.4GW of offshore generation. Tendering the ownership of the links is expected to result in savings of at least £700m across the first three tender rounds, as winning bidders have undercut the amount that monopoly transmission owners would be expected to accept for owning and operating the links. 

DTPBBE has purchased the link and transmission assets from a consortium comprising Orsted A/S KIRKBI A/S, and PKA which owns the Burbo Bank Extension windfarm.

Further information

For media, contact:

Chris Lock: 0207 901 7225

Media out of hours mobile: 07766 511470 (media calls only) 

Notes to editors

  1. The offshore regulatory regime was developed by the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (formerly the Department of Energy and Climate Change) and Ofgem, and launched in 2009. 
  2. Ofgem is also running OFTO Tender Round 5. This started in September 2016 and consists of five projects: Dudgeon, Race Bank, Walney Extension, Galloper and Rampion. Ofgem expects to launch Tender Round 6 later this year.
  3. For further information, see Offshore transmission tenders

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