Amid plenty of concern that home-grown companies are failing to reap the economic benefits of Scotland's transition to renewable energy, it's heartening to see deals such as the one today announced by Aurora Energy Services.
The Inverness-based group has completed its first international acquisition, and its largest deal to date, with the purchase of Cotech Group. Based in Houston, Texas, Cotech is a specialist in the repair and maintenance of wind turbine blades.
Keen to dispel claims that Scotland has missed out on past opportunities to convert expertise from the oil and gas sector into a robust green energy supply chain, First Minister Humza Yousaf announced earlier this week that the Scottish Government will invest £500 million during the next five years into the country's offshore wind supply chain. It follows last year's completion of the ScotWind leasing round in which 17 winners such as Shell and BP were given the go-ahead to develop offshore wind power schemes eventually generating up to 25 gigawatts of renewable electricity.
The Scottish Government will receive £700m in lease payments from ScotWind, but the biggest selling point was meant to have been been hundreds of thousands of new sustainable jobs and an estimated £25bn of supply chain investment in Scotland.
The number of "green jobs" created so far by the net-zero transition has been a fraction of those initially suggested, with industry body Scottish Renewables warning today that the sector is "increasingly under threat from international competition for the supply chains, financing and skilled workers needed to build a net-zero economy".
Led by a team with plenty of experience in building large-scale operations, Aurora seems determined to buck this trend. And though a significant amount of financing is coming from major Australian shareholder Niall Conlon, the company's headquarters and the rest of the executive management team appear firmly rooted in Scotland.
Aurora' growth and success will help strengthen the wider green energy supply chain in Scotland, which is of course welcome. But many others will need to join the front of the pack if Scotland is to win the race to cash in on the renewables bonanza.
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