A small Scottish wind developer today announced it has secured a £50 million investment deal that will allow them to advance dozens of small-scale wind projects around Scotland.

The news comes as major financiers from around the world gather in Edinburgh for a two-day conference in financing low-carbon technologies.

e-Gen, a Borders-based business, has secured the funding package from Rockfield Energy Investments LLP, the energy investment team backed by Bregal Capital.

Together they’ll set up a new company – e-Gen Partners Limited – to focus on wind projects in the 500kW to 1500kW band across rural Scotland.

Working primarily with farmers and landowners e-Gen Partners is set to fund the development, construction and operation of hundreds of small-scale wind projects.

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Already e-Gen has four sites in the planning pipeline and 25 sites at Heads of Terms stage with individual landowners across Scotland.

The company has developed a unique, sophisticated constraint mapping tool, allowing them to identify areas where the three key factors of wind speeds, planning consent and grid connections are optimised.

e-Gen has also invested significant time and energy into establishing a network of specialist contractors, suppliers and advisors, allowing them to offer a seamless process from application to commissioning.

By placing bulk orders with its turbine suppliers in Germany, Denmark and Spain, e-Gen can bring down lead times from order to delivery to just four months.

CEO of e-Gen, Tom Forsyth, said he believed they had a unique offer for landowners and farmers across Scotland who want to avoid taking the risk of development onboard: “We believe our business model can deliver big benefits to farmers and landowners across rural Scotland, by adding value to their properties and boosting their incomes at no cost or risk to themselves.

“In terms of number or size of turbines we are not typical wind farm developers. Our sector is the community scale project for which planning consents are typically faster and less complex, and visual impact is minimal.

“The investment and support from Rockfield Energy - together with our network of specialist suppliers - will allow us to move quickly so that landowners can capture the certainty of the Feed-in Tariffs before they are reviewed in 2012.”

(GK)