A WIND FARM near New Cumnock has been flogged for £78 million just two years after it was given approval by the Scottish government.

Energy giant E.ON has sold the project to InfraRed Capital Partners.

E.ON wrote to residents in New Cumnock to update them on the sale of the 25 turbine project and confirmed that InfraRed will continue to use the services of National Power, a local company who worked on the project with E.ON, who will over see the day-to-day management of the project on site whilst Infrared funds the work.

InfraRed revealed details of the deal in a statement.

The project has so far secured grid connectivity and construction is expected to get under way in the fourth quarter of 2016, with full generation anticipated for the fourth quarter of 2017.

The primary contractors involved in this project are maintenance contractor Gamesa, civil and electrical contractor Farrans Construction and Neas Energy.

When the wind farm was approved by energy minister, Fergus Ewing in October 2014 it was said that once complete, the site would have the potential to power the equivalent of almost 35,000 homes and generate community benefit funding of up to £9.2million over its lifetime.

Bryn Jones from InfraRed, said: “InfraRed is pleased to add this investment opportunity to its portfolio and utilise its extensive experience in developing wind farms. This investment opportunity arose at short notice and our experience in converting late stage development onshore wind farms and managing construction has allowed us to successfully complete the transaction within a matter of weeks with support from E.ON.”

InfraRed is a global investment manager focused on infrastructure and real estate.

They are based in London with offices in Hong Kong, New York, Paris, Seoul and Sydney and it manages in excess of $9 billion of equity capital in multiple private and listed funds, primarily for institutional investors across the globe.