Campaign group raises concerns about £58m paid to four Bute Energy shareholders

Martin Shipton

A controversial energy company that is imposing redundancies on its workforce has been challenged to be more transparent about payments totalling £58m paid to four of its principal shareholders.

Earlier this week we revealed how Green GEN Cymru, which wants to build a network of pylons across rural Wales, is making an undisclosed number of its employees redundant.

Green GEN’s sister company Bute Energy has ambitious parallel plans to build a network of giant wind turbines. It is also making workers redundant, we have been told.

Both firms belong to the Windward Energy Group and are Cardiff-based but Scottish owned. Their plans have been met with considerable opposition in Mid Wales by residents who fear that the natural beauty of the landscape will be spoilt unnecessarily.

In February 2025 Bute Energy announced that it was receiving an investment of £600m from Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners, a major international investor in renewable energy schemes. In addition public sector pension funds in Wales have invested in Bute.

An interested party sent Nation.Cymru a briefing on financial transactions involving Bute Energy which stated: “Based on the most recent Companies House filings up to early 2026 and investigative analysis of the group’s structure, significant sums of money have been extracted from the Bute Energy and Windward Energy groups by Oliver Millican and other co-promoters.

These transactions were primarily structured as dividends rather than simple loan repayments, though they involved complex internal corporate manoeuvres to bypass ‘distributable reserve’ restrictions.

“1. The £58 Million Dividend Distribution. The most substantial ‘cash out’ occurred following a restructuring in 2023–2024. According to filings for Windward Energy Limited (the parent entity), a total dividend of £58m was paid out to its shareholders.The breakdown of this distribution based on shareholding percentages is as follows: Oliver Millican, Windward Global Limited, 82%, £47.56m; Stuart George, Windward SG Limited, 8%, £4.64m; Lawson Steele, Windward LS Limited, 8%, £4.64 million; John Reilly, Windward JR Limited, 2%, £1.16m.

“2. The Source of Funds & Corporate ‘Tricks’. The filings reveal that these funds originated from a £60m payment made by Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (CIP) to Bute Energy Development Holdings (BEDH) for a ‘call option’ (the right to buy into energy parks in the future). Because the group had significant accumulated losses and no ‘distributable reserves’ (legal profit available to pay dividends), the directors employed a complex accounting mechanism: revaluation. They revalued their subsidiary companies upwards by £190m based on future cash flow projections.

“Deferred Share Scheme. They converted this revaluation into a ‘deferred share’, which was then cancelled days later to ‘create’ distributable reserves.

“Legal Rectification: The 2024 accounts initially ‘reversed’ this dividend as a receivable (meaning the money stayed with the individuals but was technically owed back to the company) because of legal deficiencies in the original filing. However, in January 2025 the group obtained a court order to repeat the process and ‘reinstate’ the dividend legally.

“Section 1096 Filings. In February 2025, the company successfully petitioned the court to remove/delete certain records of these earlier transactions from the public Companies House register to ‘rectify’ the administrative trail.

“3. Loan Repayments and Internal Asset Sales. In addition to the main dividend, filings for Bute Energy Cambria (BEC) and Bute Energy Development Holdings (BEDH) show further ‘taking out’ of money through internal asset transfers.

“2022: BEDH acquired 11 energy parks from BEC for £24m.

“June 2025: BEDH acquired 6 more parks from BEC for £17m.

“Purpose. The filings note that the proceeds from these sales were used by BEC to repay loans and pay further dividends up the chain to the parent companies controlled by Millican and his partners.

“Summary of ‘Money Taken Out’. While the group frequently refers to ‘investment in Wales’, the filings indicate that Oliver Millican has personally (via Windward Global) benefited from roughly £47.5m in dividends.The group utilised fair value accounting (valuing the company on what it might be worth in the future) to pay out cash that was technically provided by external investors (CIP) as part of development funding.”

‘Extraordinary’

Jenny Chryss, campaign lead for the group RE-think, which opposes the erection of giant wind turbines and pylons across Mid Wales, said: “We at RE-think find it extraordinary that these directors have seen fit to milk £58m in dividends from the business in somewhat doubtful circumstances while many people across Wales have been sick with worry about the effect that the windfarm and power line proposals could have on their livelihoods and property values. At the very least it is crass and thoughtless in the extreme and Oliver Millican in particular should hang his head in shame.

“These transactions clearly demonstrate that the proposed wind farms are not primarily for investment in Wales but for investment into the pockets of the four principals. It puts the promise of community benefits of a few million pounds into stark context.

“I wonder how Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners feel about the way that the money has been used, and, more importantly, the pensioners invested in the proposed wind farms through development loans from the Wales Pension Partnership.”

“Presumably it’s embarrassment that has kept the Windward Energy Group directors noticeably absent from public consultations about their plans. It’s time that some transparency is shown so that local communities can see what is really going on with the funding behind these proposed schemes.”

‘Future value’

A spokesperson for Bute Energy said: “These valuations have been independently audited by KPMG and reflect the future value of the business as additional projects secure consent. All relevant information has been disclosed through the appropriate statutory filings and is publicly available. As the matter is fully addressed within those disclosures, we do not intend to comment further.”

We pressed Green GEN Cymru for details about recent redundancies at the company and were told: “In relation to GGC specifically, we do not comment on internal employment matters, including any discussions relating to staffing or organisational structure. We are continuing to engage directly with employees in the usual way and in accordance with all relevant legal and regulatory obligations.”

We also asked Bute Energy for details of redundancies it was implementing and whether a formal consultation process was underway. We received no response.