Purchase price & financing

In 2021, the estimated market value of the Wind’s Eye land and timber crop was around £3 million. This will be updated during the CATS process through discussions between FLS and HDT. Whatever the outcome of those discussions, HDT will still need to find significant funds to make the acquisition happen.

Our plan is to seek support from:

• Scottish Land Fund (which helped HDT buy Greenmyres and contributed towards our Wind’s Eye feasibility study)
• Other grant funders
• Community investment and fundraising
• Forward-selling income from forestry
• Commercial borrowing

Money to develop future projects on the land at Wind’s Eye would be sought from a similar range of sources, as well as HDT’s own income.

The proposed wind turbines would be largely funded by commercial borrowing, but HDT is also keen to explore the potential for community shares/bonds. HDT’s Greenmyres project is the Scottish case study referred to in GB Energy’s recently published “Local Power Plan”, and the Wind’s Eye project could be well-placed to attract support from their £1 billion community energy investment fund.