Global renewable energy firm Low Carbon has agreed a new power purchase agreement (PPA) with luxury hotel chain Maybourne, powering Maybourne’s hotels with 100% clean solar energy.
The 15-year PPA agreed between the two companies will see Low Carbon supply Maybourne with 32GWh of solar energy per year, which will supply 100% of Maybourne’s London hotels with clean energy. The energy used to power the hotels, including top luxury hotels The Berkeley, The Connaught, The Emory and Claridge’s, will come from Low Carbon’s Maldon Wycke solar farm.
The Maldon Wycke solar PV power plant is a 25MW development around 1km outside of the town of Maldon, Essex, which connects to the grid via the Maldon substation. According to Low Carbon, the project generates approximately 24,900MWh per year.
Commenting on the announcement, founder and chief executive of Low Carbon, Roy Bedlow, said: “Today’s announcement confirming that we will power Maybourne’s London hotels with 100% renewable energy marks another step forward in Low Carbon’s journey to becoming a leading Independent Power Producer (IPP) and demonstrates our commitment to delivering renewables at scale and fighting climate change.”
Roland Fasel, group chief operating officer at Maybourne, added: “At Maybourne we recognise the crucial role which the hospitality industry has to play in achieving net zero and we aim to consistently make changes for the better. We are proud to have worked in partnership with Low Carbon to ensure that 100% of the electricity for our London hotels is provided via renewable energy. It is important, now more than ever, that we leave the right footprint for our guests and colleagues by maximising our ESG strategy”.
Will 2025 be a big year for Low Carbon?
This is the not the first major PPA announcement Low Carbon has made so far in 2025. In January, the company announced that it had inked a PPA with Quebec-based carbon removal project developer Deep Sky. Under the 10-year PPA, Low Carbon will supply Deep Sky with 10GWh of energy per year from its Lethbridge 1 solar project in Canada to power Deep Sky’s first facility in Alberta, Canada.
Looking ahead throughout the year, a significant amount of attention will be on Low Carbon as it begins developing a newly announced solar Nationally Significant Infrastructure Project (NSIP) proposal. In November of last year, the firm announced it was in the early stages of development on project proposals for the 500MW South Kent Energy Park, and had begun the first phase of community outreach. The first community consultation phase for the project closed in late December, and further outreach is expected to take place across 2025. The project will combine 500MW of solar generation capacity with a battery energy storage system (BESS), although the proposed BESS capacity has not been revealed.
