Power group in £50m wind farm deal

THE South East's largest wind farm - off the Kent coast in the Thames Estuary - has sold all the electricity it will generate in the next three years to London's main provider, EDF Energy.

EDF, the French owner of the former London Electricity, is paying £50m to Kentish Flats wind farm for the 300 gigawatt-hours its 30 giant turbines are expected to produce over the period.

That indicates that EDF, which only this week raised its electricity prices to households for the third time in 10 months, is paying about three times the going rate for electricity produced by power stations.

EDF, like all UK energy companies, has to take 5% of its electricity from renewable sources, rising to 10% by the end of the decade.

Wind energy - especially from offshore facilities - is much more expensive because of the cost of getting it on to the National Grid.

Kentish Flats, which is expected to start operating in May, is owned by Danish power company Elsam.