Japan’s Mitsui & Co has acquired a 50% stake in Yushan Energy Company Ltd which owns a 40% interest in the Hai Long offshore wind development in the Taiwan Strait between Taiwan and mainland China.
Mitsui acquired the 50% stake from Enterprize Energy, which controls the remaining 50% stake in Yushan Energy. Enterprize Energy was advised by Watson Farley & Williams (WFW) on this joint venture investment.
This acquisition represents Mitsui’s first entry into the Taiwanese offshore wind sector.
The Hai Long offshore wind development is a joint venture between Yushan Energy and Canada’s Northland Power Inc. The originally proposed Hai Long development comprises two projects, Hai Long 2 and Hai Long 3, with a total capacity of around 1.2GW.
The Taiwan Bureau of Energy recently allocated 300MW to the Hai Long 2 project under Taiwan’s feed-in tariff programme.
In April of this year, Taiwan awarded grid capacity to seven developers to lead work on 3.8GW of offshore wind farms to be completed by 2025 and requiring a potential investment of USD32.5bn.
Singapore-based Enterprize Energy aims to use Taiwan as a base from which to expand its operations into other ASEAN countries, and to develop export potential for Taiwanese contractors and suppliers.