The senior debt, in conjunction with the equity investment by Green Power Reserves Limited, will provide the Company with the funding to bring the battery park to commercial operations in June 2023.
The senior debt facility agreement is entered into with Close Leasing Limited (“CLL”), pursuant to which CLL will provide a development loan to fund the construction, which will be utilized in stages following the expenditure of the equity investment. The development loan will then be refinanced into a 10 year amortized term loan upon the start of commercial operations. Scott Poulter, Pacific Green's Chief Executive, commented: “Reaching Financial Close is a big milestone in Pacific Green's transition into the world's leading vertical energy developer. This development has proven itself through the rigorous due diligence process and requirements of project finance, providing a template for Pacific Green to scale rapidly.“ James Sutcliffe, Managing Director of Close Brothers Leasing's Energy team remarked: “We are thrilled to participate in this groundbreaking project finance scheme on one of the UK's largest battery energy storage systems, we look forward to working with Pacific Green on this project and the rest of their 1.1 GW UK pipeline.“ Scott added: “Bankable projects such as Richborough Energy Park are the cornerstone of Pacific Green's “ODCO2 Energy Development Platform”, which specializes in developing and operating optimized, turnkey renewable energy and storage parks across their entire lifecycle.“ CLL is a market leader in providing specialist, structured finance solutions ranging in value from £250,000 to £50 million, particularly working with select, strategic partners to offer finance solutions in the renewable energy sector. CLL is part of Close Brothers Group plc.