Airtricity, the renewable energy company, has closed a debt facility arranged by Barclays Capital, worth over €40 million. The deal will support the further development of Airtricity’s wind farm portfolio in Ireland, the UK and the USA in the coming years.
The deal delivers an immediate draw-down of €30m, a further €10m committed for Airtricity’s next wind farm and a template for qualifying future wind farms to be funded by the facility.
The deal is a first for the renewables sector. According to Fintan Whelan, corporate finance manager at Airtricity, ‘As a private, non-rated company we have, for the first time, been able to raise bank finance based exclusively on the cash flows of our projects, rather than our funding being capped at around 85 per cent of project cost.’
‘Our operating wind farms pay dividends but rather than wait for that cash to come in over time, we are borrowing against it now to accelerate our investment in future wind farms. The facility is insulated from the performance of any one project because the borrowing is against the consolidated cash flows of all our operating wind farms,’ he said.
Barclays is one of the market leading funders in Ireland, having funded, or committed to fund, over 100 mega watts of wind farms throughout Ireland. A&L Goodbody acted as legal advisor on the transaction for Barclays Capital. |