RWE has signed a virtual power purchase agreement (VPPA) with Oracle covering 433 MW of electricity from three existing wind farms in Texas.
The agreement covers output from RWE’s Panther Creek I, II and III projects in Sterling, Howard and Glasscock counties in West Texas. The wind farms provide an existing generation source rather than representing new capacity being added specifically for the agreement.
Oracle said the VPPA forms part of a wider portfolio of power investments representing more than 1.7 GW of generation capacity supporting the Texas electricity system.
Under a VPPA, the customer does not take physical delivery of electricity from a specific generating facility. Instead, the agreement provides a long-term financial arrangement linked to the project’s electricity output and renewable attributes, while the generated power continues to enter the wider electricity market.
The deal comes as electricity demand in Texas continues to grow, including from datacentres and other large industrial loads. Oracle is expanding cloud and artificial intelligence infrastructure and has set a target of matching 100% of its AI datacentre electricity consumption with carbon-free electricity by 2035.
The Panther Creek facilities have previously undergone repowering. Panther Creek I and II were repowered in 2019, while Panther Creek III was repowered in 2021.
RWE said the projects are also expected to generate more than $70 million in property-tax revenue over their operating lives for Sterling, Howard and Glasscock counties. The revenues contribute to local services including schools, roads and emergency response.
For RWE, the agreement provides another corporate route for monetising output from its established US renewable portfolio while responding to growing demand from large electricity users.
The company has continued to expand its US generation portfolio, with a focus on renewable generation and other energy infrastructure intended to serve rising electricity demand from manufacturing, datacentres and wider electrification.
The Oracle agreement also illustrates the role of corporate power contracts in financing and allocating the output and environmental attributes of renewable generation within increasingly constrained regional electricity markets.
