Aquila Clean Energy to Invest EUR 2 Bn for 2.6 GW RE Projects

Aquila Clean Energy EMEA, the clean energy development platform in Europe of Aquila Capital, has announced that it has closed a EUR 1 billion construction facility, supported by the InvestEU programme. The financing is to support development and construction of Aquila Clean Energy’s entire renewable energy pipeline in Spain and Portugal over the next three years.

The EUR 1 billion construction facility consists of a EUR 400 million credit from European Investment Bank (EIB) – supported by an EU budget guarantee under InvestEU – and EUR 600 million from a consortium of commercial banks. For the total project volume of over EUR 2 billion, the remaining amount of more than EUR 1 billion comes from funds managed by Aquila Capital, said Aquila Clean Energy.

The pipeline consists of more than 50 projects of solar and onshore wind assets having total capacity of 2.6  GW, a volume equivalent to the annual consumption of 1.4 million households. These projects will have an estimated yield of 5.3 TWh annually.

Aquila Clean Energy said that the vast majority of investments are expected to be located in the European Investment Bank’s (EIB) cohesion priority regions, thus supporting the economic recovery in these regions which were particularly affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.

For the construction facility, Santander acted as the Facility and Security Agent. NatWest acted as Documentation Agent and KfW IPEX-Bank as Hedging Documentation Agent. BNP Paribas, ING, Intesa SanPaolo and Banco Sabadell further supported the facility. The debt was significantly oversubscribed, confirming lenders’ strong interest in the financing.

The company also informed that this project was made possible because of an EU budget guarantee under the InvestEU programme, which allows the EIB to increase its risk taking capacity and in this particular case, to assume electricity merchant risk under a non-recourse financing structure as the transaction does not involve any price hedge mechanism such as PPA.

Susanne Wermter, CEO, Aquila Clean Energy EMEA, emphasised, “This transaction constitutes the largest financing in the history of Aquila Clean Energy and Aquila Capital. It demonstrates the creditability and appeal of our clean energy assets that aim to actively shape the European energy transition. With the financing now secured, we are opening up additional growth for our company and with the planned assets we will be able to offer our investors further interesting opportunities.”

Ricardo Mourinho Félix, EIB Vice-President, said, “As the EU climate bank, we put sustainable development at the heart of our activities. We are therefore extremely proud of financing this project, through a Green Loan that contributes substantively to Europe’s energy transition and the security of energy supply.”

Currently, Aquila Capital manages nearly 14 billion euros on behalf of institutional investors worldwide to achieve carbon neutrality businesses. Currently, Aquila Clean Energy manages a portfolio with a total capacity of more than 8.2GW.