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Rabat – French energy company TotalEnergies has invested £20 million to acquire a minority stake in the Morocco-UK Power Project from UK startup Xlinks, the energy company said in a statement.
With this move, TotalEnergies is joining a list of other investors including Octopus Energy and Abu Dhabi National Energy Company. In April, British renewable energy group Octopus Energy and Abu Dhabi National Energy Company TAQA invested £30 million in the project.
The colossal $24.5 billion energy project Xlinks is developing plans to harness solar and wind power from Morocco’s Southern region and transmit it to the UK via the world’s longest subsea cable.
Under the plan, electricity will be transported via a 3,800-kilometer subsea cable stretching from the Sahara to the North Devon village of Alverdiscott, where it will be integrated into the UK’s national grid.
The project will boast a remarkable generation capacity of 10.5 gigawatts, with 7GW originating from solar sources and 3.5GW from wind, the UK startup says.
Early estimates suggest that once online, the cable would be able to supply green electricity to over 7 million homes in the UK, satisfying approximately 8% of the nation’s power needs
Commenting on the news of TotalEnergies’ investment, Simon Morrish, Chief Executive Officer of Xlinks, said his company is “excited to welcome Europe’s largest energy company to be a part of our ambitious vision to foster long-distance power exchanges through this iconic partnership with the UK and Morocco.”
“TotalEnergies’ investment goes far beyond capital,” he said, adding that it “provides a rare combination of expertise in areas that meet the unique challenges we face.”
Read Also: German Energy-Focused Company Invests in UK-Morocco Xlinks Marine Cable
According to Morrish, the investment “marks a highly successful end to 2023 and will give us an even greater impetus to achieve our goals as we enter 2024.”
For his part, Vincent Stoquart, Senior Vice President of Renewables at TotalEnergies, said: “We are delighted to join the Xlinks project and its other investors to support the development of such a pioneering and ambitious endeavor.”
“This innovative project will benefit from our track record in developing large and complex integrated energy projects,” he added.
After months of stagnation due to legal hurdles caused by the UK’s political turmoil in late 2022, the Xlinks project gained significant traction in 2023.
In September 2023, Claire Coutinho, the newly appointed UK Energy Secretary, announced that the project received the designation of a project of “national significance.”
The designation is expected to streamline the planning and approval process for the project. It is also expected to help the company raise the funding needed to finance the project.
