by Shane Henson — January 2, 2012—Google, global investment firm Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. L.P. (KKR), and Recurrent Energy, a solar project developer marketing clean power to utilities and large energy users, recently announced an investment in a portfolio of solar photovoltaic (PV) facilities serving the Sacramento Municipal Utility District (SMUD).
The portfolio of projects is financed with a combination of debt and equity, which includes a significant equity investment from Google in addition to equity from SunTap Energy RE LLC, a new venture formed by KKR to invest in solar projects in the United States.
The four solar PV facilities included in the transaction will provide 88 MW of power to SMUD and were the first to be awarded as part of the utility’s feed-in tariff program (FIT) introduced in January 2010. Construction on three of the Sacramento, California area projects will be complete early in 2012, with the fourth coming online later in the year. The projects are expected to generate nearly 160,000,000 kWh in their first year of operation, which is roughly equivalent to offsetting the electricity consumption of more than 13,000 average U.S. homes.
Google’s investment in these projects brings its total invested to more than $915 million in renewable energy projects, the company’s leadership said. The company has invested in a wide range of technologies, from transmission to the world’s largest wind and solar power tower projects. This represents Google’s first investment in the United States in utility-scale solar PV.
“Google’s commitment to clean energy continues to be a core value for the company,” said Axel Martinez, assistant treasurer at Google. “Over the past 18 months, Google has made investments in the sector that not only help deploy hundreds of megawatts of sustainable power, but also enable new and exciting business opportunities. We’re excited to be supporting KKR’s entrance into the renewable energy sector in the U.S. We hope the sector continues to attract new sources of capital.”
