Spain’s Iberdrola, the largest renewable energy operator in the world, has signed deals to buy a U.S. wind power company for $30 million and to study setting up a new wind farm in northern China as it expands abroad to meet its targets.
Iberdrola said on Tuesday it would buy Pennsylvania-based Community Energy, which has projects to develop 2,200 megawatts of wind-power capacity along the east coast of the United States -- which it described as one of its most important markets.
About 200 MW of the capacity are in advanced stages of development while the other 2,000 MW are in preliminary stages and are likely to be approved, Iberdrola said.
“The focus is to further internationalize ourselves, without poor acquisitions. A bad hunter can become the hunted,” Chief Executive and Chairman Ignacio Sanchez Galan said in an interview in Tuesday’s El Pais newspaper.
“In the coming years we will invest around 12 billion euros ($15.2 billion) and continue to grow. In Europe we are strong and we will announce important moves in the United States and in emerging countries like China. We have 4,000 megawatts in wind power and we will put in place another 6,000 megawatts.”
Iberdrola aims to have 6,200 MW of installed renewable energy capacity by 2008 and top the 10,000 MW mark by 2011.
At the end of the first quarter, it had installed capacity of 3,914 MW from renewable sources, 3,598 MW of it from wind.
Iberdrola also said it had signed an agreement with authorities in northern China to study the area around Bayannaoer to find suitable spots to install 1,000 MW of wind-power capacity.
Iberdrola would have exclusive rights to study the area for five years and pledged to install 300 MW by 2008 and 1,000 by the end of 2010.
However, it said it would only go ahead with building the capacity if wind tests were positive and if the regulatory framework in China ensured its investment would be protected and that it would be able to make a profit.