John Laing Group plc (LON:JLG), the responsible investor and active manager of infrastructure projects internationally, has announced that it has completed the sale of its Swedish wind farm, Rammeldalsberget, to Slitevind AB for cash consideration of €8.9 million before disposal costs, equivalent to approximately £7.6 million.
This sale value represents an 8% uplift to John Laing’s book value for the asset at 31 December 2020. The Rammeldalsberget project is a mature operational project within the Group’s secondary portfolio, having been operational since 2016, and this sale is consistent with the Group’s strategy to realise these types of secondary assets and re-invest the proceeds in new opportunities in greenfield projects and in economic infrastructure businesses and platforms.
Rammeldalsberget is a 15.75 MW onshore wind farm located near Kramfors, Sweden. John Laing first invested in Rammeldalsberget in 2014 and brought it into operation in 2016. The wind farm has an operational track record of almost five years and is fully exposed to merchant power prices.
Shareholders participate in the success of realisations through the special dividend, with the Group paying out approximately 5-10% of gross proceeds received from the sale of investments on an annual basis. This sale adds to the visibility of the 2021 special dividend, with total proceeds eligible to be included in the 2021 special dividend calculation now amounting to approximately £358 million[1], consisting of expected proceeds from this sale as well as the sales of the Australian wind farm portfolio that completed last week and the second stage of IEP East divestment expected to complete later in the year.
Ben Loomes, Chief Executive of John Laing Group, said:
“Following on from the completion of the sale of our Australian wind farm portfolio last week, the divestment of Rammeldalsberget is in line with our strategy to realise fully our Renewable Energy assets over the next two years. This will reduce the portfolio exposure to merchant power prices and the corresponding volatility in portfolio value and returns. The sale of Rammeldalsberget is also consistent with our approach of enhancing the efficiency of our resources as we focus on investing larger equity investments in the future and rationalising the portfolio by divesting smaller, but resource intensive assets.”
