Borrego Solar Systems Inc. has broken ground on the Seneca Solar Projects, an 8.3 MW portfolio of fixed-tilt ground-mounted projects in Victorville, Calif.
Owned by Salt Lake City-based independent power producer sPower, this portfolio is Borrego Solar's second portfolio of projects under utility Southern California Edison's (SCE) California Renewable Energy Small Tariff (CREST) program.
The first CREST portfolio, located in Desert Hot Springs, was completed at the end of 2013. Borrego Solar explains it acquired the projects during late-stage development under an agreement to co-develop and provide all of the necessary project financing, engineering, procurement and construction of the solar facilities. Once all development hurdles were overcome, sPower purchased the shovel-ready portfolio before mobilization on site.
"With our model of buying utility projects, cleaning them up, aggregating them and packaging them up for financing, we anticipate spending a certain amount of time bringing financiers up to speed on the nuances of the investment opportunity," says Brian von Moos, director of utility project development at Borrego Solar.
"sPower's extensive development experience and leadership position within the utility sector and its depth of access to low-cost capital allowed us to fast-track the financing stage and achieve the project velocity critical to meeting hard, utility-set deadlines."
The energy generated from the Seneca Solar Projects will be sold at a set price to SCE for 20 years as part of the utility's CREST program.
