Soltage LLC closed a first round of investment in a 38 project, 100-megawatt (MW) solar project portfolio located in five states across the East Coast and the Southeast. The portfolio includes a large asset acquisition from project developer, Southern Current, alongside other Soltage-developed projects, and is a follow-on investment under a partnership between Soltage and Basalt Infrastructure Partners. Construction on the current portfolio is underway, with projects expected to reach commercial operation across the calendar years of 2018 and 2019.
The individual projects in the portfolio, which range from 2 MW to 6 MW, are located across North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Virginia and New Jersey, and will sell power to utility off takers including Duke Energy, Dominion Energy and Georgia Power under long term contracts. The portfolio of solar assets will generate roughly 160,000 megawatt-hours of clean energy annually, enough to power nearly 18,000 homes, and will offset roughly 300 million pounds of carbon dioxide on an annual basis.
“This portfolio demonstrates the continued market demand for distributed utility solar assets, with utilities and private consumers looking for large and efficiently constructed projects to deliver clean and affordable power near the point of customer demand,” said Jesse Grossman, Soltage CEO and Co-Founder. “Portfolios like this represent a high degree of complexity to develop, structure, finance and construct and the Soltage team focuses on executional excellence in this space. We combine scalable and flexible capital with high-quality partners and over a decade of experience to boost this market segment as it continues to grow at increasing speed.”
Soltage’s current investment is part of a wider utility-scale solar surge across the country. According to a report by GTM Research and the Solar Energy Industries Association, despite uncertainty and a tumultuous 2017 stemming from government-imposed solar tariffs, utility-scale project deployment has accelerated in Q2 2018and that growth is expected to continue. As of Q2 2018, a total of 17 gigawatts (GW) of utility solar projects were announced for the year and at 4.7 GW, the industry is witnessing more solar installed in the first half of 2018 than any other first half in the sector’s history.
Soltage is a full-service renewable energy Independent Power Producer developing, financing, installing, owning and operating solar power generating stations, providing electricity to commercial and industrial (C&I), educational, utility and municipal customers. The company has more than 80 solar projects and more than 250 MW of generation capacity under management across twelve states and has deployed more than $500 million into solar generation projects since 2006. Basalt is an infrastructure equity investment fund focused on utility, energy, and transport infrastructure in the U.S., Canada, and Europe.
— Solar Builder magazine
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