Acme Solar Holdings raises $334 million via green bonds

ACME SOLAR RECENTLY ROPED IN BROOKFIELD RENEWABLE PARTNERS FOR JOINTLY SETTING UP A SOLAR PLANT IN RAJASTHAN

NEW DELHI: Acme Solar Holdings Pvt. Ltd on Friday said it has raised $334 million through dollar-denominated green bonds. This comes against the backdrop of a flurry of green bonds by Indian clean energy developers with a growing global focus on environment, sustainability, and governance (ESG) investing.

“Twelve projects of Acme Solar Holdings Pvt. Ltd (ACME) today agreed to a debt investment of approximately $334 million through dollar-denominated green bonds that were successfully priced on Friday,” the firm said in a statement.

Acme Solar recently roped in Brookfield Renewable Partners for jointly setting up a solar project in Rajasthan, as part of its playbook to sell equity stake in its projects.

Denmark’s state owned fund IFU, United Nations Office for Project Services S3i, and Norway’s Scatec acquired also stakes in separate Acme Solar projects in Rajasthan.

“The bonds will be issued by an offshore company and proceeds of the bonds will be used for subscription of non-convertible debentures issued by Acme’s projects. The bonds will have a tenor of five years and a coupon rate of 4.7%. The issue was oversubscribed more than three times, which is a testimony of the strong business fundamentals of the underlying assets,” the company said.

“We have always been supported well by our Indian lenders and we are very happy to receive encouraging support from international investors as well. This will broaden our source of capital,” said Manoj K. Upadhyay, founder and chairman, Acme Group.

There is growing interest among investors in India’s solar generation and equipment manufacturing space.

“Global issuance of green, social, and sustainability bonds, or sustainable bonds, collectively , is expected to hit $850 billion in 2021, a new annual record and a 59% jump from 2020,” Moody’s Investors Service said on Thursday.

“Following record first-half issuance, we now forecast about $450 billion of green bonds and $200 billion each of social bonds and sustainability bonds this year,” said Matthew Kuchtyak, assistant vice president, analyst, at Moody’s.

Acme Solar, founded in 2003 by Upadhyay, has been looking at new business opportunities in energy storage, green hydrogen, and ammonia.

The company plans to produce green hydrogen in India and Europe with Lhyfe Labs SAS of France. Acme Solar and Oman’s Tatweer also plan to invest $2.5 billion for green ammonia and green hydrogen production.

“Acme understands that the issue received tremendous response from marquee investors with a distribution split of 56%/ 22%/ 22% between the Asia-Pacific, Europe, the Middle East, and Africa, and North America and Latin America regions. The bonds will list on Singapore Exchange Securities Trading Ltd,” Acme Solar said.

Acme Solar is the last entirely promoter-owned large green energy platform in India. Of its portfolio of 4.8 GW, 2.2 GW is operational.