The gas-fired Ballylumford power station has been vended out for £99m to the possessors of Kilroot power station.

The AES Corporation said that it had reached accord to buy Ballylumford Premier Power, which is a subsidiary of the BG Group.

The greater part of the County Antrim plant's production is contracted to Northern Ireland Electricity.

There has been general conjecture for a while that the power station may possibly be sold off.

BG Group has owned Premier Power, ever since 1992 and sells its productivity into the Irish Single Electricity market, both directly and by means of sales to NIE Energy.

It supplies approximately 9% of the island of Ireland's demand and represents about 12% of installed Irish capacity.

The deal is subject to license permissions from the Northern Ireland Authority for Utility Regulation and the Northern Ireland Department of Enterprise, Trade and Industry, and is estimated to be finished in the second half of this year.

When the transaction is concluded, it will denote that AES will offer just about 15% of the capacity in the Single Electricity Market.