Enlight Renewable Energy has received debt financing for a major solar and energy storage project in the United States.
The Country Acres project, located near Sacramento, California, consists of 403MW of solar generation and 688MWh of energy storage capacity.
The debt financing package includes $773m of construction loans, which have been secured by Enlight through its subsidiary Clenera Holdings LLC.
The financing deals were agreed with a consortium of four global banks including BNP Paribas Securities Corp, Crédit Agricole, Natixis Corporate & Investment Banking, and Nord/LB.
Once commercial operations begin, the construction loan is expected to convert into a $376m term loan.
The project has a 30-year solar generation busbar power purchase agreement (PPA) and 20-year energy storage busbar PPA with the Sacramento Municipal Utility District.
Construction at the 966-acre site has already begun, and all procurement contracts have been signed. The project is expected to begin commercial operations in the second half of 2026.
It is expected to provide clean electricity equivalent to the average annual consumption of approximately 80,000 Californian households.
President and chief executive of Clenera Adam Pishl said: “We are grateful to once again be partnering with leading banks on one of our largest projects.
“The American-generated, reliable energy produced at Country Acres will be fuelling the homes and businesses in central California for decades to come.”
Country Acres is one of several major solar and energy storage projects that Enlight and Clenera are now constructing in the US.
These include Quail Ranch (128MW and 400MWh) and Roadrunner (290MW and 940MWh).
“Country Acres is the second financial closing that we have accomplished with the same group of lenders in the past three months, illustrating the extent of our partnership and cooperation,” said Enlight USA general manager Ilan Goren.
“We look forward to further deepening this relationship as Enlight and Clenera continue the build-out of our large US project portfolio.”
Enlight’s next projects in the western US will be Snowflake (600MW and 1900MWh) and CO Bar (1211MW and 824MWh).
These two projects have almost completed their development phase and construction is due to begin in the coming months.
Each of the two projects employs a grid connection of 1GW, one of the largest in the US.