Arevon Energy, a solar and storage project developer, closed the financing on the Vikings solar-plus-storage project with a combination of debt financing and tax credit transfer.
The company secured a commitment with J.P. Morgan to purchase $191 million in investment tax credits and production tax credits leveraging the Inflation Reduction Act’s transferability provision. Arevon also secured an additional $338 million debt facility.
The debt facility was provided by MUFG, BNP Paribas, Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation, and First Citizens Bank, who acted as Coordinating Lead Arrangers. National Bank of Canada also participated as a lender.
“ITC and PTC tax credit transferability is a major step forward for the energy transition, post-IRA, and we are excited to be able to leverage it on the Vikings financing structure,” said Daniel Murphy, Arevon’s Director of Project Finance. “This solar peaking project concept is a key strategy for Arevon, and we are grateful to our financing parties for their support on this groundbreaking financing using tax credit transferability.”
The Viking project is located in Imperial County, California, consisting of 157 MW of solar coupled with 150 MW/ 600 MWh of energy storage project. Vikings is contracted to provide resource adequacy and renewable energy to San Diego Community Power, helping to support grid reliability beginning in 2024.
The PV modules for the project are supplied by First Solar, along with solar trackers from Nextracker. Tesla is supplying the facility’s utility-scale batteries, which allow the solar energy generated to be directed to the grid during peak demand, powering up to 50,000 homes.
Construction of the facility is well underway, with commercial operations scheduled for the third quarter of 2024. San Diego-headquartered SOLV Energy is performing the construction activities.
Stoel Rives represented Arevon as legal counsel; Milbank LLP served as transfer counsel; and Winston & Strawn LLP served as lender counsel.
According to Mercom’s 9M and Q3 2023 Solar Funding and M&A Report noted that announced large-scale project funding in the first nine months of 2023 came to $27.5 billion in 169 project funding deals, a 20% increase compared to $22.9 billion in 128 projects in 9M 2022.
