Terra Nova buys $180m stake in solar portfolio

Terra Nova Renewable Partners, a partnership between SunEdison and JP Morgan Asset Management, has spent $180 million on a stake in a 336-megawatt (MW) solar portfolio from energy provider Dominion.

Terra Nova’s purchase of a 33 percent stake in Dominion’s portfolio is the first part of a deal that could see it acquire a total of 567MW from the energy provider in early 2016. As part of the deal, Terra Nova has the option to purchase Dominion’s remaining 67 percent interest in the 24 project portfolio through an indirect subsidiary.

The portfolio bought in the first phase includes 15 projects in Indiana, Georgia, Connecticut, California, Tennessee and Utah. All solar farms are in operation and the largest single solar farm is the 59.1MW Camelot project, near Mojave, California. This portfolio has power purchase agreements for all the projects for almost 20 years.

SunEdison, one of the world’s largest solar providers, has five years to buy the assets Terra Nova just purchased.

Terra Nova is a partnership vehicle between SunEdison and JP Morgan. Through the partnership, JP Morgan’s clients provide equity to purchase renewable projects developed or purchased by SunEdison. SunEdison keeps an option to repurchase the assets for its yieldco, TerraForm Power, for five years.

While SunEdison maintains the right to purchase assets from the partnership, it more recently completed a sale to Terra Nova. In December, SunEdison sold two wind farms generating 333MW to Terra Nova for $209 million.

This article was first published on Low Carbon Energy Investor, Infrastructure Investor’s sister publication focused on global energy transition markets.