Watson, Farley & Williams (“WFW”), a leading international law firm, is pleased to announce that it has advised Blue Energy and Santander on the sale of Hall Farm Wind Farm (“Hall Farm”) to John Laing.

Hall Farm is an operational 24.5MW onshore facility based on the Routh Estate in Beverley, South Yorkshire and was acquired as part of the 177MW portfolio purchased from Hg Capital in January 2013, and since then construction has been completed and commercial operations have successfully commenced.

Wragge & Co's Energy team has advised on a major transaction to acquire sites for the construction of solar farms in the UK. Primrose Solar, jointly backed by York Capital and Pioneer Point Partners Ltd, acquired five sites across South Wales and the South Coast. The sites have planning permission and construction is about to commence. When built, the farms will add 38 megawatt hours (MWh) to the grid, enough to supply around 11,500 homes and save up to 16,400 tonnes of CO2 annually.

Slaughter and May advised Premier Oil plc on the establishment of its £500,000,000 Euro Medium Term Note Programme for the issuance by Premier Oil plc of senior unsecured notes. Premier Oil plc may issue wholesale and retail notes under the Programme. Notes issued under the Programme will be guaranteed by certain subsidiaries of Premier Oil plc. The base prospectus in relation to the Programme was approved by the UK Listing Authority on 18 November 2013.

The Programme has been arranged by Lloyds Bank plc.

Ashurst has advised EnQuest on a new US$1.7 billion credit facility, underwritten by BNP Paribas and Scotiabank. The facility comprises a committed amount of US$1.2 billion for six years. A further US$500 million is available with the lenders' consent and additional reserves. The facility is to be used for general purposes and replaces the existing facility put in place in Q1 2012.

The Ashurst team was led by oil and gas structured finance partner Huw Thomas, assisted by senior associate Nicholas Ross-McCall and associate Nicholas Szmigin.

Corporate partner Richard Spedding has been leading a cross-departmental team advising Noble Corporation plc as English counsel on its $9.9bn cross-border merger with Noble Corporation (Switzerland). The merger was announced in July this year and became effective today. As of today, Noble Corporation plc is listed on NYSE and has become the holding company for the Noble group.

Noble is a leading offshore drilling contractor for the oil and gas industry. Noble performs, through its subsidiaries, contract drilling services with a fleet of 79 offshore drilling units.

Slaughter and May, working as a team with Cravath, Swaine & Moore LLP and De Brauw Blackstone Westbroek, advised Royal Dutch Shell plc on the issue of a quadruple-tranche US$4 billion bond under its US shelf programme. The issue consists of US$1 billion 0.900% Fixed Rate Notes due 2016, US$1.25 billion 2.000% Fixed Rate Notes due 2018, US$750 million Floating Rate Notes due 2015 and US$1 billion Floating Rate Notes due 2016, in each case issued by Shell International Finance B.V. and guaranteed by Royal Dutch Shell plc.

Global legal practice Norton Rose Fulbright has advised Canadian Vermilion Energy Inc. on the acquisition of a 25 percent interest in four producing natural gas fields and a surrounding exploration license located in northwest Germany from GDF SUEZ E&P Deutschland GmbH (GDF SUEZ). GDF SUEZ is selling its interest in a consortium consisting of four partners.

Slaughter and May advised China Power New Energy Development Company (CPNE) on its issue of new shares to China Energy Engineering Group Guangdong Electric Power Design Institute (GEPDI).

Under a new share agreement, CPNE will issue new shares to GEPDI for RMB200 million (US$33 million), giving GEPDI a 2.87% share in the enlarged issued share capital of CPNE.

Watson, Farley & Williams (“WFW”), a leading international law firm, is pleased to announce that it has advised Union Investment on its acquisition of the onshore wind farm “Gibbet Hill” in County Wexford, Ireland from the German project developer ABO Wind.

The “Gibbett Hill” wind farm, which has been operational since July 2013, consists of six wind turbines with a total capacity of 15 MW.

Latham & Watkins advised Sembcorp Salalah Power & Water Company SAOG in connection with its initial public offering (IPO), which was 8.3 times oversubscribed and raised OMR 53 million (approximately US$137 million), making it the largest IPO in Oman this year as well as one of the largest in the Middle East region. Following the IPO, the shares of Sembcorp Salalah were admitted to trading on the Muscat Securities Market.

HSBC Bank Oman SAOG acted as Issue Manager for the offering. HSBC Bank Middle East Limited acted as Sole Global Coordinator and Bookrunner.