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Ofgem has determined the final assessed cost of the transmission assets of the Race Bank offshore windfarm should be £472.5 million.

These costs are a reduction of £22.3 million initially submitted by the asset owners, a consortium of Orsted, Macquarie Infrastructure Fund 5, Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation and Development Bank of Japan and funds advised by Macquarie Capital.

Diamond Transmission Partners was chosen as the preferred bidder for the project in June last year.

The consortium, made up of the Mitsubishi Corporation and the HICL Infrastructure Company, was chosen by the regulator in the fifth round of competitive tenders under the offshore transmission owners (OFTO) regime.

Ofgem published its draft cost assessment on Friday (23 August) to determine the value of the assets that are to be transferred following a successful bid.

The transmission assets include:

  • Two offshore platforms and associated electrical equipment;
  • Two subsea export cables of approximately 71km each;
  • Two onshore cables of approximately 11.6km;
  • A subsea cable interlink between the two OSPs of approximately 6.5km;
  • One onshore substation at Walpole St. Andrew

Ofgem added that it does not expect any further changes to the assessed costs but added that it does not intend to finalise the final transfer value until the Gas and Electricity Markets Authority (GEMA) has determined to grant an offshore transmission licence.

The windfarm was officially opened in June last year and has a total capacity of 573MW, consisting of 91 Siemens Gamesa 6MW turbines.