Glennmont Partners Completes Refinancing of Sleaford Biomass Plant for £150m
Glennmont Partners has successfully completed the refinancing of the Sleaford Renewable Energy Plant on behalf of its dedicated clean energy fund, Glennmont Clean Energy Fund Europe I, as part of a programme of realisations of value from the Fund. Glennmont Partners is one of Europe’s largest fund managers focusing exclusively on investment in clean energy infrastructure. Glennmont raises long-term capital to invest in alternative power generation projects including wind farms, biomass power stations, solar parks and small-scale hydro power plants. The carefully selected, risk managed investments deliver sustained performance and predictable returns over periods of 10 years or more.
Sleaford REP is a 40MWe straw-fired biomass plant located in Lincolnshire, UK. The plant has been in operation since 2014 and is being operated by Burmeister & Wain Scandinavian Contractor (BWSC). The plant benefits from 2 ROCs under the UK renewable energy regime as “good quality CHP plant”, providing free heat to the local community under long term offtake contracts. The proceeds from the refinancing repaid a project financing, and contributed to directly creating value for investors.
The £150m financing has been placed to a large European institutional investor and is the largest institutional-only financing in the UK biomass sector to date. Deutsche Bank acted as sole lead Arranger, Agent, Security Trustee and Account Bank for the transaction.
Joost Bergsma, CEO of Glennmont Partners, said: “Glennmont is delighted to be completing one of the largest biomass transactions of 2017 for £150m. This transaction further highlights that biomass is a highly efficient renewable energy technology capable of attracting significant amounts of long term, competitive institutional capital. The refinancing complements our strategy of building portfolios of renewable projects diversified by both geography and technology in order to provide predictable returns to investors. The energy market is as diverse as it has ever been with new technologies and new market structures offering investors a wide range of opportunities to invest in clean energy.”
Michael Volkermann, Head of Infrastructure & Energy at Deutsche Bank said ““We are delighted to build on our close relationship with Glennmont Partners by together delivering this pathfinder refinancing transaction for the UK biomass industry and placing it with a leading European infrastructure debt investor.”
Notes to Editors
1. Glennmont Partners
Glennmont Partners invests in construction and operational stage clean energy infrastructure assets in on-shore wind, solar photovoltaic, biomass and small-scale hydro power generation in Europe. The Fund is managed by a dedicated, international and highly focused management team, drawn from a range of backgrounds within the renewable energy and financial fields. The Fund is investing in a diversified portfolio of high quality assets in Western European economies, enabling the investment team to manage risk while maximising returns. http://www.glennmont.com/
