ContourGlobal, an independent power producer and a KKR company, announced the acquisition of a solar project portfolio totaling 446 MWp from Qcells, a solar cell manufacturer and project developer. The portfolio is comprised of two projects in Colorado and Virginia.
The Northern Colorado project, totaling 324 MWp capacity, is currently under construction, while the Virginia project, totaling 122 MWp, is expected to begin construction in 2026.
The Platte River Power Authority will receive the electricity produced from the Colorado project under a 22-year power purchase agreement. The project’s first phase totals 185 MW, with commercial operation scheduled for the first half of 2025. The project’s second phase will add 139 MW of capacity by 2026.
The Virginia project is scheduled for commercial operation in 2027, benefitting from a 20-year power purchase agreement with a utility.
Qcells will be responsible for the construction of the projects, utilizing domestically manufactured solar modules by the company at their Dalton and Cartersville facilities in Georgia.
CRC-IB acted as the exclusive buy-side advisor to ContourGlobal, while Marathon Capital served as the exclusive financial advisor to Qcells on the transaction.
With the acquisition of the portfolio, ContourGlobal has expanded its renewable energy footprint further in the Western Electricity Coordinating Council (WECC) and Pennsylvania-New Jersey–Maryland (PJM) interconnection markets.
The transaction has also increased the company’s solar and battery energy storage system (BESS) capacity in the U.S. to almost 1.5 GW, approximately 1.2 GW of solar PV, and 0.3 GW of BESS in all stages of development.
According to Mercom’s Annual and Q4 2024 Solar Funding and M&A report, 217 large-scale solar project acquisitions totaling 37.7 GW were transacted in 2024, compared to 231 transactions totaling 45.4 GW in 2023.
Last year in October, ContourGlobal announced the acquisition of a 151 MW solar project portfolio in South Carolina from Sun Tribe Development, a solar and energy storage project developer.
