Independent power producer Sonnedix has closed a €730 million (US$841 million) financing for the refinancing, optimisation, and construction of renewable energy assets across Southern Europe.
The financing will cover solar PV plants with a combined capacity of 540MW and two battery energy storage system (BESS) assets across France, Italy, Portugal and Spain.
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According to the IPP, this transaction reinforces its growing momentum across Southern Europe, while the inclusion of BESS projects in this latest financing round will support the company’s strategy to hybridise its portfolio and strengthen the flexibility, resilience and value of its renewable energy platform.
Most of the projects financed will be located in Italy, with a 350MW portfolio for that country alone.
In Italy, the company has been expanding its portfolio of PV projects with several acquisitions in the past few months. This includes a 226MW portfolio of five projects in Sicily and Lazio last September and six solar PV projects with a combined 194MW of capacity earlier this year.
Sonnedix boasts a development pipeline of nearly 1.4GW in the Southern European country, where it has been awarded capacity in last year’s Fonti di Energia Rinnovabile (FER) X auction. PV Tech Premium spoke in April with Sonnedix’s Italy managing director, Mario Volpe, about the Italian market and the country’s important solar PV and BESS auctions (subscription required).
The financing has been carried out with financial firms AIB, CACIB, CIBC, ING, Intesa Sanpaolo, Sabadell, Santander CIB, Societe Generale, and UniCredit. Some of the financial firms participating in this financing round – Sabadell and CIBC, among others – had previously financed 102MW solar PV portfolio from Sonnedix in Spain and Italy in June of this year.
Axel Thiemann, CEO of Sonnedix, said: “This financing reflects Sonnedix’s commitment to developing high quality renewable projects in our strategic markets. It follows our recent BESS portfolio acquisition in Italy, and underscores the pace at which we are scaling our storage capabilities across Europe.”
As Thiemann highlighted, the IPP recently acquired two BESS projects in Tuscany, central Italy, from developer Sphera Energy. The standalone projects total 160MW/640MWh and 100MW/400MWh and will help Sonnedix provide competitively priced renewable energy power in Italy.
Currently, Sonnedix has a total renewables portfolio capacity of 12GW, of which more than 1GW is under construction, 4GW is in operation and 6GW is under development. The IPP operates in Chile, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Poland, Portugal, Spain, and the UK.
