Iona Capital Ltd (‘Iona’), the environmental investment specialist, announced today that it has completed an investment of £750,000 in Rosewood Energy Ltd (“Rosewood”), a Joint venture company established with Biogen UK ltd (“Biogen”), a leading UK owner and operator of Anaerobic Digestion (‘AD’) facilities.
The investment from the Iona Environmental VCT will finance additional capital equipment to enable the Northamptonshire based plant, owned and operated by Biogen, to increase capacity and produce around 1.5 MW of electricity. This electricity will be produced from biomass waste provided by local suppliers including major supermarket outlets and also from some London Boroughs including Hounslow and Ealing. This electricity is sold into the grid and also receives a double renewable obligations certificate payment from a regional electricity generator. Double ROCs are the highest OFGEM banding for this type of energy technology, which came into force in April 2009.
The electricity produced by Rosewood will be roughly the equivalent of supplying the total annual electricity needs of around 2,000 domestic users in the Bedford area.
Mike Dunn, partner at Iona Capital, will join the Rosewood Board bringing a further 15 years of waste management experience to the Company. Mike comments:
“This deal is further evidence of the key role Iona is playing in helping the UK to meet its landfill diversion and recycling targets. Rosewood is typical of many other environmentally sustainable deals we’re working on with Biogen. Escalating landfill tax and the Government’s targets for renewable energy are the two key drivers promoting investment in recycling and energy from waste. Obtaining double ROCs represents recognition by regulators of the sustainability and advanced nature of the technology. With a number of further AD facilities in our pipeline we look forward to the continued development of our investment strategy.”
Richard Barker, CEO of BiogenGreenfinch, operator of the Rosewood facility added:
Iona Capital brings a strong understanding of the AD model, the UK waste sector and local authority procurement processes. This, together with their collaborative and practical approach to delivering a robust funding solution have made them a good partner to deal with.”
For further information, please read the article “Biogen secures investment for UK waste-to-energy plant expansion” to see Mike Dunn’s and Richard Barker’s views on this investment.
