Germany's Union Investment has acquired the Burton Pidsea wind farm in north-eastern England for its institutional infrastructure fund UniInstitutional Infrastruktur SICAV-SIF.

The seller of the onshore wind farm, which started operation in December, is Bremen-based listed company, Energiekontor, which will handle technical and commercial operation of the facility.

Union Investment said its first infrastructure fund is now invested in five European wind farms in Germany, France, Ireland and UK, and has largely achieved planned broad diversification across different manufacturers and feed-in systems.

Christoph Schumacher, a member of the management team at Union Investment Institutional Property, adviser to the fund, said:

"Within the renewable energy field, onshore wind power is currently considered to be the technology which is capable of seriously competing with production costs of conventional electricity, given the right location.That makes wind power a highly attractive investment technology for us and our investors."

The wind farm has three type 3.4 M turbines installed by Repower of Hamburg. Burton Pidsea wind farm has a rated output of 10.2 megawatts, Union Investment said.

The fund  had acquired two wind farms located in Greneville en Beauce, in France, and Gibbet Hill (County Wexford) in Ireland in October 2013.

In August 2013, Union Investment made a second closing of its infrastructure fund launched last year, collecting additional €100 million in equity for total investment capacity of €350 million. The focus will be on wind farms (onshore projects), making up around 70% of total assets. An investment of up to 30% in photovoltaic systems is also planned.

Union Investment is the investment arm of the DZ Bank Group and part of the cooperative financial services network. It is headquartered in Frankfurt.