Duke Energy Renewables, a subsidiary of Duke Energy, has closed $109.4 million in preferred tax equity funding from Goldman Sachs’ Alternative Energy Investing Group.
The investment will be used over 18 months to fund a diverse portfolio of approximately 75 MW of solar and solar+storage projects, which will be developed and constructed by Duke Energy Renewables’ subsidiary REC Solar. Projects will feature ground-mount and rooftop commercial and industrial projects, as well as community solar projects across several different states including Arizona, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Massachusetts and Texas.
Goldman Sachs’s investment structure, monetizing both cash and tax attributes generated by the projects, is tailored to finance large, distributed portfolios of renewables assets. Monetizing the investment in this way allows Duke Energy Renewables to free up capital to continue to invest in its distributed generation portfolio.
“Our partnership with Duke Energy Renewables demonstrates the benefits of an integrated approach to financing high-quality distributed solar projects at scale,” says Vivek Kagzi of Goldman Sachs’ Alternative Energy Investing Group.
“By combining the financing of tax and cash attributes into a single product, Goldman Sachs is able to provide sponsors like Duke Energy Renewables with comprehensive and flexible financing solutions tailored to each individual portfolio’s needs,” adds Kagzi.
The portfolio comprises behind-the-meter and utility-scale installations that will provide power to a wide range of private sector and public sector customers through long-term power purchase agreements (PPAs).
NextPower Capital acted as the financial advisor to Duke Energy Renewables and REC Solar, and Hunton Andrews Kurth LLP and O’Melveny & Myers LLP were the transaction legal counsels for Duke Energy Renewables and Goldman Sachs, respectively.
