SSE Irish subsidiary pays €100m dividend to Scottish parent

SSE Airtricity, one of the largest electricity suppliers in Ireland, recorded a sharp drop in revenues last year as a related subsidiary, SSE Renewables paid out a €100 million dividend to its Scottish parent.

Recently filed accounts for SSE Airtricity Limited, which employs more than 350 people, show turnover fell from €877.2 million to €766.8 million for the 12 months ending March 2017.

The company recorded a pretax profit of €41.2 million, excluding the impact of derivative instruments, up from €37.7 million a year earlier.

“While revenue has fallen following a decision to decrease tariffs, performance has returned to pre-2016 results,” directors of the company said in a note accompanying the accounts.

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SSE Airtricity, a wholly-owned division of the FTSE-listed SSE PLC, is the second largest energy supplier in Ireland Ireland with about 800,000 home and business customers.

The SSE group, which has invested more than €2 billion in the Irish market since 2008, operates over 1,800MW of generation capacity across Ireland, including nearly 550MW from renewable sources, making it the third largest energy generator by capacity in the all-island single electricity market.

SSE Airtricity employed 353 people during the year under review with staff-related costs totalling €16.5 million, up from €15.6 million in the year to the end of March 2016.

Meanwhile, SSE Renewables Holdings, the immediate parent of Airtricity, and Ireland’s largest renewable energy developer, reported a €104.5 million pretax profit last year, up from just €45.3 million a year earlier due to dividend income receivable from investments. It subsequently paid the majority of this dividend to SSE Plc.

A company spokesman said the dividend paid to SSE plc is related to the sale of four renewable generation assets back in 2013 to Greencoat UK Wind, the largest portion of profit coming from the Braes of Doune Wind Farm in Sterling, Scotland.

SSE Renewables has invested over €1 billion in Irish renewables to date, building onshore and offshore wind farms, hydro, marine and solar projects.

Separately, SSE Plc raised its full-year profit outlook on Wednesday as wet and windy weather drove a 25 per cent rise in production from its renewable energy plants in its first three quarters.

The supplier said it expects to deliver adjusted earnings per share in the range of 116 to 120 pence having previous forecast earnings in line with the consensus forecast of 116 pence.