Scottish and Southern Energy (SSE) has agreed to invest up to £ 15 million for a 20% stake in Geothermal International Ltd (GI).
SSE's investment will be made during the next six months and is the ninth purchase deal made by the firm since SSE's venture team was created a year ago.

GI, headquartered in Coventry, supplies ground source heating and cooling systems for commercial buildings. Established in 2000, the firm has installed over 1,300 ground source heat pump systems.

Brian Davidson, the founder and CEO of GI, said: 'We look forward to working with SSE's other renewable energy partners, as well as providing ESCO solutions for developers, house builders and local authorities that deploy ground source heat pumps on a large scale.'

SSE says it hopes to benefit from having a commercial foothold in geothermal energy and a significant stake in a business which is dominating a rapidly growing sector of the European heat market.

Ian Marchant, chief executive of SSE said: 'SSE is rapidly building a strong portfolio of clean energy businesses that cover almost every part of the renewable and alternative energy market in the UK'.

He added 'Geothermal energy has been an obvious missing piece in this portfolio and this deal fills the gap very effectively'.