I had something else planned to go out on Monday, but I’ve held it back in light of fresh information I’ve received about the activities of Bute Energy. Information that raises wider considerations.

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INTRODUCTION

Let me start with an apology. I’ve been writing about Bute’s activities in Wales for seven or eight years. This meant ignoring projects elsewhere, and overlooking Bute and Windward companies that had no obvious Welsh connection.

That may have been a mistake. And in view of recent events suggesting dubious links with China, no longer tenable. Dealt with on this blog.

Apology made, one company I have mentioned, one I could never make sense of, was Storagefolk Ltd. Presumably involved in . . . warehousing?

Launched 23.09.2017 Storagefolk appears to be the oldest surviving Windward-Bute company apart from Windward Enterprises Ltd (until very recently Windward Global), the ultimate holding company, where Oliver James Millican, capo di tutti capi in the W-B world, is in sole charge.

But what’s its purpose, and how does it fit into the wider empire? Information received offers some answers. And opens up a new line of inquiry.

As you can see from the Companies House entry for Storagefolk the address is in Mayfair, that upmarket district of London. The sole director is Millican. But he gives his address as Hodge House in Cardiff, where we find virtually all the companies relevant to Wales. Or at least, those we know about.

Listed as ‘person with significant control‘ (PSC) is Windward Global Ltd.

Though if we go through the main CH listing for Millican’s companies we see Storagefolk using the Hodge House address. (More Millican companies are listed here, here, here, and here.)

At the address in Curzon Street, hosting Storagefolk, we find Turcan Connell Company Secretaries Ltd. Scottish legal eagles with their HQ in Edinburgh. A company regularly used by Millican and his mates.

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MY! WHAT A BIG WAREHOUSE YOU’VE GOT. AND SO MANY OF THEM!

Of the companies registered at that address, we’re interested in the ones shown in the panel below. Particularly those to which I’ve been directed. (Storagefolk appears on the previous page.)

Beginning with Windward Eurocentral MD Ltd. Sole director Oliver Millican. PSC is Windward RE Holdco Ltd (more on this company later). PSC for Windward RE Holdco Ltd is Windward Enterprises Ltd, the ultimate holding company mentioned earlier.

Turn to the charges and you’ll see one taken out in July 2023 and satisfied in April 2025. The lender was private bank Brown Shipley & Co Ltd. Brown Shipley is owned by Quintet Private Bank (Europe) SA of Luxembourg, which is in turn owned by Precision Capital:

Precision Capital is a Luxembourg-based holding company that represents the private interests of members of the Al-Thani family of Qatar.

The charge was against a building just to the east of Glasgow, close to the M8 that runs to Edinburgh. A property offering 127,000 square foot of space.

The next company is Windward Badentoy Ltd. Directors are Millican and TC Directors Ltd with an Edinburgh address. ‘TC’ of course is Turcan Connell again. The PSC is Windward RE Holdco 2 Ltd.

The charges, again with Brown Shipley, refer to industrial storage units such as this one, all near Aberdeen. Plus a floating charge.

The third is Windward RE Project Co 1 Ltd. Here are the players. It’s the Mayfair address with PSC again being Windward RE Holdco 2 Ltd. There are/were two outstanding charges with Brown Shipley. One a fixed and floating charge, the other refers to three properties in Aberdeen and Edinburgh.

Another company worth looking at is Windward Z3B Ltd, with the same pattern. Funding from Brown Shipley for two more storage facilities on industrial or technology parks around Aberdeen.

And there was another company, one that I wrote about in August 2024. And other warehouse not far from the M8.

It was reported on October 2, 2018 that the Titan warehouse had been bought for £6.5M by Grayling Capital. This is Grayling Capital LLP, formed just over a year earlier.

David Taylor, one of those recently questioned by police in relation to China ‘spying’, was made a partner in Grayling Capital LLP in September 2019.

I could go on, but you should get the picture. Companies in the W-B empire have, for perhaps a decade, been buying up big warehouses, often borrowing from a ’boutique’ bank owned by an oil-rich family in Qatar.

A name mentioned in connection with W-B’s activity in the Aberdeen area is IKM. Said to be a tenant of properties owned by Windward-Bute. Here’s a piece from December last year and the Aberdeen Press & Journal.

In another major milestone, IKM Testing UK today opens its third facility as it pushes ahead with plans to expand into international markets, the renewables sector and increase its UK decommissioning work.

But IKM only accounts for some of W-B’s real estate, so the question remains: Why does it need all this storage space?

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PLANNING AHEAD?

First, let me clear up the purpose of Storagefolk before telling you how Windward-Bute buying up vast areas of storage space was explained to me:

(Storagefolk) is purely a negotiating shell for projects in Scotland and NE England; it is used in proposals to financiers, a distinct legal entity is then formed post-investment decision to ring fence properties and interests – and distance from the risk of course.

As for the warehouses, it seems that W-B has been importing parts and components for turbines, solar installations, and Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS) for quite a few years.

This stockpiling is in anticipation of a crackdown on imported parts for ‘renewable’ energy projects. This seems plausible as the opposition mounts to increasing energy prices resulting from ‘Mad’ Ed Miliband’s Net Zero death-wish.

The real estate arm of the Windward portfolio . . . is working with multiple overseas businesses and at least one national government to house interests and commodity items relating to renewables infrastructure. There are warehouses in Wales and Scotland filled to the rafters with BESS and pylon materials – rented and landed for resale exclusively to the UK market to artificially appear to restrict overseas procurement and brand it as available when supply chains pinch in the late 2027 to early 2029 drive.

Is it just forward planning, or is there more to it?

As an example of ‘more to it’, can we assume these imports come from China? I’d put a few quid on it. And if I’ve picked the right nag, then this explains a few other things.

For as we’ve recently learnt, it’s impossible to escape the China connection when dealing with Windward-Bute. So I was not surprised to be told that two of the Big Three (Oliver James Millican, Stuart Allan George, and Lawson Douglas Steel) have even stated they’d sell to “interested parties from China at the right price“.

But none of these machinations would be possible without political influence, and that influence is not confined to Labour in Wales.

Let’s remember that Tom Watson, former deputy leader of the UK Labour party, now Baron Watson of Wyre Forest, is a non-executive director of Windward Energy Ltd, where he’s listed as plain old Thomas Anthony Watson.

It’s suggested this provides a good connection through Great British Energy to ‘Mad’ Ed Miliband himself, the apostle of Net Zero, de-industrialisation, and electricity consumer impoverishment.

To sum up: there is a concerted effort not only to increase expenditure and reliance on ‘renewables’, but also to remove cheaper and more reliable alternatives. This explains why the UK is closing down North Sea oil and gas . . . only to buy from Norway, which extracts from the same North Sea source.

Proving it has sod all to do with saving the planet.

This is the ugly world inhabited by Windward-Bute. It’s not limited to wind turbines despoiling landscapes, it’s about using political influence to remove competition providing more reliable and cheaper alternatives.

In Wales, this has resulted in the infiltration of the Labour party to the point where it’s hopelessly compromised. Election posters for May’s Senedd elections should read: ‘Vote for Dai Jones – your Bute Welsh Labour candidate‘.

We know W-B is also making inroads into Plaid Cymru. The Greens were always on side. But does it end there?

Maybe not.

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TITBITS, THOUGHTS

In this section I’ll look at a few other items that have come my way and how they perhaps fit with what we already knew.

First, I’m told that Nigel Farage had a closed-door meeting in January with Windward Energy Ltd Chairman Steve Scrimshaw. So let’s have a statement from Reform on where it stands on ‘renewable energy’ and rising electricity prices.

More closed door negotiations preceded the decision by the Wales Pension Partnership to invest £68m (for starters?) in Windward-Bute. A source says that very influential in the ultimate decision was Cardiff Lib Dem councillor Rhys Taylor.

Taylor of course sits on the council’s Pensions Committee, but I bet you can’t guess where his day job is. Let me help . . .

So we see that Windward-Bute also has its claws into the Lib Dems.

Leaving Gwlad the only honest party left.

I’m told the investigations into Taylor and Aplin might result in a number of Senedd Members, MSPs and MPs being invited to ‘help police with their inquiries’.

Understandably, Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (CIP), the main funders for W-B’s renewable energy projects, is said to be pissed off by the recent news and allegations of spying for China.

Which provides yet another link to ‘Welsh’ Labour. Through Helle Thorning-Schmidt, former Danish PM, her directorship of Vestas since 2019, and that company’s 25% stake in CIP.

Helle Thorning-Schmidt is the wife of Stephen Kinnock, MP for Aberavon Maesteg. He is of course the son of former Labour party leader now Baron Kinnock of Bedwellty in the County of Gwent, and the late Baroness Kinnock of Holyhead, long-time Member of the European Parliament.

Her seat on the Brussels gravy-train was taken by Derek Vaughan who, following Brexit, was given a non-job by Windward-Bute on its Welsh Advisory Board.

Kinnock the Younger’s constituency is home to Port Talbot steelworks, so recently and shamelessly allowed to die. Welcomed in certain circles because it reduces Wales’ output of some evil dreamed up by Greenhairs.

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I’m going to throw out an idea that might sound outrageous, yet it’s plausible. Just think about it.

Millican, Steele and George all worked for real estate outfit Parabola, where Millican’s father Peter is head man. They all left Parabola towards the end of 2017. (Or that’s what we’re encouraged to believe.)

They had no experience in ‘renewables’; and to my knowledge they’ve still not erected a single turbine. Certainly not in Wales. But is this missing the point?

They now have sites designated, landowners signed up, planning applications submitted, politicians and others bought, financial backing for the projects arranged, and warehouses stacked to the gunwales with the wherewithal to complete the projects.

So if Windward-Bute only gets half or less of the planning consents applied for – even no planning approval at all – they could still sell up and make a massive profit. Especially if the anticipated crackdown on (recently) imported parts comes into play and the components they bought years ago rocket in price.

Maybe that was always the business model. Not actually building anything.

If nothing else, it’ll be a very lucrative fall-back position.

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CONCLUSION

Windward-Bute has corrupted Welsh political and public life. And it was so predictable.

With a form of devolved government designed to fail. And with ‘progressive’ politicians too stupid and gullible to have made even a good model work.

Made worse by those same politicians seriously believing Wales alone could save a planet being destroyed by humans – and their farting cows!

Politicians believing that lobbyists and pressure groups should determine policies, and that they should be able to do so free from regulation or restraint.

Resulting in overlapping and incestuous circles in one relatively small city, circles of perhaps no more than two or three thousand people in total, damaging the lives of over three million people.

This shit-show was bound to attract the kinds of ‘developers’ we’ve seen over the past 27 years. With Windward-Bute perhaps the worst, the most pernicious example.

Windward-Bute already has the shadow of ‘China spying’ hanging over it, and the stain of buying political influence, but it doesn’t end there.

The West’s lemming-like rush over the cliff of ‘renewables’ isn’t just good news for China, on which we depend for everything from rare earth minerals to completed solar panels; it’s also welcomed in the oil-rich Gulf states because ‘renewables’ are also unreliables, and need back-up.

Some might think that a UK-based company or individuals enriching themselves from helping de-industrialise and impoverish the West is tantamount to treason.

And I would agree. For ‘renewables’ are a response to nothing but avarice.

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© Royston Jones 2026