Mountgrange invests £17m in UK waste-to-energy project

The real estate fund manager has invested £16.7m in the development of a waste-to-biomass power plant in Cambridgeshire, England.

The Mountgrange Real Estate Opportunity Fund, managed by UK real estate asset manager Mountgrange Investment Management, has invested close to £17 million (€19 million; $27 million) in the development of a waste-to-energy plant in the UK.

Mountgrange’s £300 million fund has invested in the development of a site near Peterborough, Cambridgeshire, where a large-scale waste-to-biomass power generation plant will be built, the asset manager said in a statement.

The plant will aim to generate 79 megawatts of electricity a year, powering 80,000 homes.

Peterborough Renewable Energy, a subsidiary of UK waste specialist Green Energy Parks, is leading the project and will rent the plant’s site, secured through Mountgrange’s investment, from the real estate firm.

Nick Berry, a partner at Mountgrange, thinks this transaction could serve as a template for future deals in the renewables sector:

“[Our] involvement in this project clearly represents our philosophy of identifying opportunities with the capacity for potentially attractive returns, which are not necessarily driven by traditional property investment criteria,” he said in a statement.

He added: “We believe there will be additional opportunities to apply our investment management skills in the UK renewables sector which is growing to meet targets set by government for the provision of cleaner energy in a market dominated by carbon-based electricity generation.”

Nabarro, Grant Thornton and Torrin Asset Management advised Mountgrange on the deal.