ERG enters solar energy business with acquisition of 89 MW in Italy

Italian wind energy company ERG has announced that its unit ERG Power Generation S.p.A. has agreed to buy a 100% stake in ForVei, a joint venture between Italian investment firm VEI Green and UK-based Foresight, which owns 81 MW of PV power plants in Italy.

According to ERG, the portfolio consists of 30 MW solar plants located across eight regions in northern, central and southern Italy. All of the projects, the company stressed, came online between 2010 and 2011 and will benefit from the Conto Energia incentives with an average expiry date of 2030.

The value of the transaction, which also was funded through non-recourse project financing of €180 million and lease agreements of around €60 million, amounts to around €336 million.

ForVei's PV plants are located in the regions of Piedmont (21.1 MW), Emilia-Romagna (3.3 MW), Marche (4.3 MW), Abruzzo (4.7 MW), Campania (6.7 MW), Apulia (14.7 MW), Calabria (24 MW), and Sicily (10.2 MW).

“The notable size of the transaction,“ said the company's CEO Luca Bettonte, “will immediately enable us to enlarge and optimize our energy management portfolio, with high quality facilities geographically well located also in the market area of Northern Italy, and to capitalize on our industrial skills in asset management. Moreover, ERG's entry into the Italian PV sector is taking place in the presence of a still very fragmented market scenario that could offer additional possibilities for consolidation, allowing us to gain the know-how necessary to take part in the cross-border development of a strongly expanding sector.”