Austrian utility Verbund has acquired a 110MV solar portfolio in Lazio, central Italy, from Ke-Reninvestment, a subsidiary of Turkish investor Kinesis Enerji.
The companies involved agreed not to publish the price of the transaction, which is for two projects at what Verbund calls “an advanced stage of development,” and which share a substation. The deal forms part of Verbund’s push to expand the role of solar in its energy generation mix, which is dominated by renewable energy, and hydropower in particular.
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The company notes that around 95% of its power comes from renewable energy sources, but that hydropower – with an installed operating capacity of around 8.2GW – and has sought to invest in solar and wind projects in recent years.
The Italian solar sector has received significant investment this year, with Spanish firm Elawan Energy establishing a joint venture to build 2GW of new capacity in June. Last month, figures from grid operator Terna revealed that renewable power generation exceeded that of fossil fuel generation in the first half of the year for the first time in Italian history, with solar and wind projects driving much of this progress, as output from these projects increased by 14.6% year-to-year.
However, the national government banned the development of new agrivoltaics (agriPV) projects in the country earlier this year, a move that lawyer Ginevra Biadico told PV Tech Premium was “illogical,” due to the significant potential for Europe to dramatically increase its solar output through large-scale deployment of agriPV projects.
