Three US solar companies—PureSky Energy, ClearGen Holdings and Aligned Climate Capital—have advanced distributed solar projects in the US this week, including solar-plus-storage, commercial and industrial (C&I) and community solar facilities.
PureSky Energy raises US$183.7 million to refinance solar-plus-storage portfolio
Denver-headquartered developer, owner and operator PureSky Energy has raised US$183.7 million to refinance its operating distributed solar and storage portfolio, which has a combined capacity of 221MW of solar PV.
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The portfolio consists of 42 operating assets across Massachusetts, New York and Minnesota, and includes a battery energy storage system (BESS) component of 58MWh. The refinancing will see the consolidation of eight existing debt portfolios, which covers this project portfolio, into a single structure, and PureSky CFO Rami Khadra said the deal helps “eliminate near-term refinancing risk”.
“This transaction reflects the strength of our assets and operating platform, and enables us to eliminate near-term refinancing risk while continuing to invest in long-term growth,” said Khadra.
Companies involved in the refinancing include AB CarVal, Denham Capital and PGIM; the latter was involved in a US$340 million financing arrangement for a separate distributed solar and energy storage portfolio in the US, owned by developer Nexamp, last year. Debt financing has become an integral part of the global solar financing space, with figures from Mercom showing that, in the first quarter of this year, debt financing along accounted for US$8.9 billion in investment into the global solar sector, more than double that of the previous quarter.
ClearGen Holdings acquires 19MW portfolio of C&I solar PV assets
Charlotte-based owner and asset manager ClearGen Holdings has acquired a 19MW operational portfolio of C&I solar PV assets from affiliates of Tortoise Capital Advisors.
The portfolio consists of ten behind-the-meter solar projects across five states: California, Colorado, Florida, Massachusetts and New Jersey. While the company did not provide further details of the transaction, it noted that the deal reflects its “strategy of investing in distributed energy infrastructure”.
“This acquisition is directly aligned with our strategy of acquiring and actively managing distributed energy assets that deliver long-term value,” said ClearGen CEO Rob Howard. “ClearGen is committed to owning assets like these for the long run.”
The news follows ClearGen’s US$150 million investment into a 245MW distributed solar portfolio last year with developer Davis Hill Development. That portfolio includes a community solar component, unlike its most recent investment, which covers C&I projects exclusively. Figures from the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA) show that capacity additions in the C&I space have declined in recent months—reaching 523MW across the US in the second quarter of this year, down 25% quarter-on-quarter and down 4% year-on-year—but the trade body expects capacity additions to recover in the long-term.
While SEIA expects C&I installations to fall between 2026 and 2027, driven largely by California, which is a leader in the C&I sector and will be navigating the transition to a new tariff structure in the coming years, the trade body expects annual capacity additions to increase to 2.5GW by 2030.
Aligned Climate Capital acquires Illinois community solar project
New York-headquartered clean energy asset manager Aligned Climate Capital has acquired a 7.3MW community solar project currently under development in Collinsville Township, Illinois.
Aligned expects to begin commercial operation at the Armoracia project later this year, and the project is notable for its use of Planted Solar’s project deployment platform, which uses “terrain-following arrays and automated installation” to expedite the project planning process and minimise the disruption of project installation.
Prior to Planted’s involvement, the Armoracia project was expected to occupy 26 acres, but the company’s planning approach reduced this to 16 acres, according to Planted CEO Eric Brown. Planted was also able to increase the setbacks from neighbouring buildings from the 150 feet that was initially proposed—and the minimum state requirement in Illinois—to 225 feet, creating space between the project and local residents, some of whom initially voiced opposition to the project prior to its approval by the local zoning board in April 2025.
“This acquisition matters because it helps establish Planted’s platform as financeable infrastructure at commercial scale,” said Aligned CEO Peter Davidson. “Their platform is built for land-efficient deployment, making solar work on sites where conventional approaches would require significantly more land.”
