Renewable energy start-up hopes to power two million homes in five years

A new renewable power business hopes to provide enough clean energy for two million homes within five years.

Edinburgh-based firm Renewco Power aims to accelerate the development of renewable energy projects, focusing on the rollout of large-scale solar and wind farms across the UK and Europe.

It already has a gigawatt of early stage projects in the pipeline across the UK and Europe.

And the firm, which has received backing of £24m from energy giants SSE plc, hopes to expand that so it has the capacity to provide more than 4GW (gigawatts) within five years – the equivalent to powering approximately two million households.

Renewco says its founders between them have some 100 years of experience in renewables development and investments.

Chief executive Gavin McCallum, who previously worked for BP Alternative Energy said: “There is a growing and urgent demand for utility-scale renewables projects across Europe, and we are excited about the potential we see for Renewco.

“Renewco has a unique blend of entrepreneurial talent with deep power sector and financial expertise which we will use to accelerate new developments across Europe. We will be growing our team over the coming months, adding further commercial expertise to accelerate the delivery of our strategy.”

Martin Pibworth, SSE Group energy and commercial director said the new company had a “first class management team”.

SSE expects to “generate strong returns” on its investment, he added, saying: “We see this as a complementary investment to SSE’s own core renewables and distributed energy businesses and look forward to seeing Renewco deliver their ambitious plans.”