Aquila Clean Energy EMEA, Aquila Capital’s European clean energy development platform, has raised finance for a EUR 1 billion construction facility with funding from the InvestEU programme. Over the next three years, this debt funding from European Investment Bank (EIB) and others will help in the development and construction of the company’s renewable energy pipeline in Spain and Portugal.
The projects will be executed in Spain in Castilla y León, Comunidad Valenciana, Andaluca, Cantabria, Castilla-La Mancha, and Murcia, and in Portugal in Setbal, Coimbra, Evora, and Leiria. The pipeline includes more than 50 projects wherein many of them either are solar photovoltaic or onshore wind assets with a total capacity of 2.6 GW. These projects are expected to produce 5.3 terawatt hours per year. The facility was also supported by BNP Paribas, ING, Intesa SanPaolo, and Banco Sabadell. The debt was significantly oversubscribed, indicating that lenders were very interested in the financing.
Aquila Clean Energy generates, realises, and operates clean energy assets in the solar, wind, hydropower, and battery storage industries. Aquila Clean Energy currently manages a portfolio with a total capacity of more than 8.2 GW.
REGlobal’s Views: This large financing for built-to-sell renewable energy construction facility includes one of the biggest loans ever granted by the EIB under a project finance structure. Further, EIB mostly engages in long-term lending in the infrastructure sector, and thus, this short-term construction financing is a new approach for the organisation.
