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Intersect Power, LLC, (“Intersect Power” or the “Company”) announced today the closing of an aggregate of $2.4 billion of new financing commitments and the allocation of $675 million of previously announced commitments for the construction and operations of four solar energy projects totaling approximately 1.5GWdc PV + 1.0GWh BESS. The transactions represent construction financing, tax equity, operational letters of credit and a portion of previously announced portfolio level term debt with industry-leading partners.
All four projects – Lumina I, Lumina II, Oberon I and Oberon II – are expected to be operational in 2023. The Lumina I and II projects, in Texas, total approximately 840 MWp and the Oberon I and II projects, in California, total approximately 685 MWp + 1,000MWh BESS. These projects are part of the Company’s late-stage portfolio totaling 2.2 GW of late-stage solar projects with 1.4 GWh of storage.
“These closings culminate a multi-year process raising more than $6 billion to build out one of the largest solar + storage portfolios our country has seen to date which serves as a platform for future growth into green hydrogen and other decarbonization technologies,” said Sheldon Kimber, CEO of Intersect Power. “The strength of our partnerships and collective teams’ determination further validates our path to decarbonize the hard-to-reach corners of the economy.”
As with Intersect Power’s $2.6B financing announcement in November 2021, these financings follow the Company’s approach by incorporating structuring and pricing provisions designed to account for the higher proportion of uncontracted revenue in the portfolio. Proceeds from the term facility will support both construction and operation of the portfolio.
MUFG and Santander served as co-lead arrangers on the approximately $1.6 billion construction financing with NORD/LB, KeyBanc Capital Markets, Helaba, CoBank, Bank of America, and Zions Bancorporation acting as Joint Lead Arrangers. CoBank ACB is providing operational letters of credit to the Oberon I & II and the Lumina II projects.
“Intersect Power has robust capabilities as a developer of transformative renewable energy projects,” said Louise Pesce, Managing Director of Project Finance at MUFG. “We are honored to be a financing partner for this phase of their large solar plus storage portfolio which will catalyze the transition to a more sustainable energy infrastructure.”
“We are very proud to have supported Intersect in this transformative capital raise process in such a meaningful way,” said Nuno Andrade, Managing Director and Head of Structured Finance US at Santander’s Corporate & Investment Banking. “Intersect continues to position itself as an innovative company that develops renewable energy projects at scale to provide clean energy and US jobs, both of which are critical for the economy and the energy transition.”
“CoBank was pleased to work with the Intersect Power team to provide operational letters of credit on a bilateral basis under an innovative structure to the Oberon I, II and Lumina II projects of the portfolio” said Jackie Bove, managing director and head of project finance at CoBank, ACB.
Concurrent with the closing of the construction financing, Intersect secured approximately $775 million of commitments from leading tax equity investors, including Morgan Stanley Renewables Inc. (Oberon II), a Fortune 100 technology company (Lumina I), and U.S. Bank (Oberon I and Lumina II).
“We’re excited to partner with Intersect Power to grow solar capacity and storage with these investments in California with Oberon I and Texas with Lumina II,” said Jon Peeples,environmental finance business development director with U.S. Bancorp Community Development Corporation, the tax credit and community investment division of U.S. Bank. “Investments like these are a tangible way U.S. Bank can be a responsible steward of the environment and combat climate change while creating jobs and positively impacting local communities.”
“We are proud to again partner with Intersect Power by providing them capital to help accelerate their scalable and innovative approaches to decarbonizing energy sources,” said Jorge Iragorri, Managing Director and Head of the Alternative Financing Group at Morgan Stanley.
The allocation of $675 million of previously announced term-loan commitments was provided by HPS Investment Partners and Co-Investors.
Intersect and its partners were represented by the following counsel and advisors on the deals: Orrick Herrington & Sutcliffe represented IP as lead counsel on all transactions and Kirkland & Ellis LLP served as Intersect’s special tax counsel; CCA Capital LLC advised IP on the tax equity transactions; Greenberg Traurig served as counsel to U.S. Bank; Milbank LLP served as counsel to the tax equity investor on Lumina I; Mayer Brown LLP served as counsel to Morgan Stanley Renewables Inc.; Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP served as counsel to HPS; and Winston & Strawn LLP served as counsel to the construction lenders.
Links
https://www.intersectpower.com/intersect-power-closes-3-1-billion-in-project-financing-to-complete-near-term-portfolio-totaling-2-2-gwdc/ |
