One of our unique offerings is acting as virtual in-house counsel for clients who either do not wish to have the headcount and associate cost of employing a lawyer or wish to supplement their legal team to deal with times of high demand or staff absences. Working within the client’s office and closely with their team over a prolonged period of time enables our lawyers to provide informed, pragmatic and commercial advice due to the greater understanding and awareness of business drivers and requirements.  Continuity is key. Examples include:

• 4 years supporting the infrastructure team of a private equity investor;
• Project-specific support related to the sale of a project vehicle with the benefit of an EFR contract;
• Provision of 2 lawyers (one property and one commercial) to a developer client associated with wind and storage projects;
• Claims management and general commercial support to a major environmental infrastructure investment fund;
• 6 months’ support during holiday and recruitment period for a major supplier / aggregator; and
• Project office-based support to 2 of the UK’s largest offshore windfarms for periods of 1 year each.

Our lawyers have worked with developers, operators and landowners in the industry for over 20 years across the UK. In that time, our team has assisted onshore and offshore windfarms, peak power plants and battery storage, waste to energy plants, solar farms, hydro schemes and anaerobic digestion plants.  The team’s experience includes sales/acquisitions, securing rights under options to buy/lease, agreement for lease, leases, easements/servitudes, wayleaves, cable crossing and proximity Agreements and assisting throughout the financial close process. Examples include:

• Providing and implementing strategic advice to an investment fund to maximise the value of one of the UK’s largest portfolios of solar assets;
• Advising developers on behind the meter battery projects and co-location of batteries with generation assets;
• Negotiating numerous options and leases for solar, wind, anaerobic digestion, energy from waste and battery storage projects;
• Advising community groups on rooftop and ground mounted solar schemes;
• Supporting various developers through The Crown Estate bid process in Scottish and English waters;
• Negotiation of onshore lease agreements for substations, port agreements and interface agreements with the OFTO and onshore land rights for cabling and access; and
• Assisting on the financing and refinancing of UK renewable and energy projects, including due diligence, certificates of title and direct agreements.

Our lawyers have worked on the myriad of commercial contracts that arise on the development, construction and operation of power projects, irrespective of technology. These range from early stage letters of intent setting out the points of principle to be incorporated into transaction documents to feedstock contracts for AD plants to grid sharing arrangements and offtake agreements. From working both within project teams and as part of the in-house legal team we have been involved throughout the project lifecycle helping the client with the design and structuring of the project and related contractual structure through to the negotiation and finalisation of the contracts.  A small flavour of the breadth of this experience includes:

• Joint development agreements, heads of terms and letters of intent;
• Structuring a development process for clients incorporating specific milestone gateways to enable risk sharing with potential purchasers;
• Production of a suite of contracts to be used for low value (>£100k) procurement activity on onshore operational wind farm sites;
• Joint operating agreement and ancillary documents for a 400MW offshore wind farm;
• Feedstock supply and digestate removal for a wider range of products than ever dreamed of for AD plants; and
• Negotiation of power purchase agreements with utility scale offtakers and aggregators.

Energy projects are increasingly complex and high risk, representing substantial capital spend for developers and investors alike. Disputes can be of a magnitude that has a profound impact on the financial success of a project. Our extensive experience ranges from the provision of legal and commercial strategic advice on disputes to the implementation of specialist in-house claim prevention and management functions. Examples include:

• Numerous successful adjudications, mediations, arbitrations, Technology & Construction Court and reported Court of Appeal proceedings;
• £multi-million offshore & onshore windfarm disputes: defects, delay loss/expense claims and specialist resolution of fishing and leisure industry conflicts;
• Management and resolution of O&M defects and performance issues across solar, AD, biomass and battery storage projects;
• Drafting and implementation of project claim management processes for 2 UK offshore windfarm projects.

We provide corporate and due diligence support at all stages in the project life-cycle – from development (e.g. MOUs, Joint Development Agreements, Heads of Terms, NDAs), to construction (e.g. plant & machinery acquisition, PPAs, EPCs) to operation (e.g. warranty & operation agreements, O&M agreements, technical service agreements). We do this both as lead lawyers and as managers of wider legal teams. The corporate team have assisted clients with the acquisition and sale of project vehicles or assets associated with solar, energy storage, wind, AD and distributed generation generally. This has included due diligence (buy and sell side) through to successful completion. Examples of the type of work:

• Management of DD debt & equity process for Galloper Offshore Wind Farm;
• Structuring and negotiation of a framework agreement for the disposal of a pipeline of 10 wind farm development sites;
• Acquisition of a large number of solar, AD, biomass, gas to grid, peaking plant and storage projects, either operational or at others stages in the development process; and
• Production and negotiation of disposal documentation with respect to wind farm, solar, storage and peaking plant projects at all stages in the development cycle from consented, to shovel ready, constructed or operational to a range of purchasers.