Cubico acquires 50 MW operating UK solar park from British Solar Renewables

Cubico Sustainable Investments has acquired the 50 MW Owls Hatch solar park located in Southern England (UK) from British Solar Renewables (BSR), a UK developer and operator of solar parks.

As a result of this acquisition Cubico has now acquired 11 projects from BSR over the last eight months, totaling 120 MW.

Located in Herne Bay Kent, England, Owls Hatch, which has been operational since March 2015, was originally developed by BSR as the engineering, procurement and construction contractor.

BSR will remain the operations and maintenance provider and will continue to be involved in all the solar parks acquired by Cubico

The project was financed using a hybrid project finance structure and total debt raised equated to £47.8 million (US$67.9 million). Nord/LB acted as mandated lead arranger and provided a term loan as well as a credit enhancement facility. Hastings’s managed funds provided £24.5 million (US$31.7 million) in long dated fixed rated notes alongside the term loans.

David Swindin, Head of EMEA at Cubico said:

“We are delighted to have worked with BSR again and to add one of the largest solar farms in the UK to our growing portfolio.”

David Peill, Commercial Director at BSR said:

“We are very pleased to have completed this significant transaction with Cubico. The proceeds of the sale allow us to recycle capital into further solar development as well as our growing energy storage pipeline”.

Heiko Ludwig, Managing Director of Nord/LB Origination Energy commented;

“This innovative financing follows the work and development by Nord/LB over the past years teaming up with institutional investors. The structure is suitable for the European market providing additional funding sources to our clients whilst keeping the flexibility of tailored project financing to renewable energy projects.”