Palisade Investment Partners (Palisade) has launched a new platform named Intera Renewables.
Intera aggregating five of Palisade’s operational renewable energy assets into a single entity of scale, with a common ownership, governance, management and financing structure.
It will uniquely focus on a combination of long-term value creation through organic growth, with particular emphasis on developing and constructing new renewable energy projects, while concurrently providing investors with stable income returns underwritten by its existing, high-quality portfolio of operating assets.
Palisade manages and operates a diverse portfolio of renewable energy assets, comprising six wind farms and one solar farm across four Australian states (Queensland, South Australia, Victoria and Tasmania).
These assets total nearly 1.5GW of installed generation capacity on a 100% ownership basis, making Palisade one of Australia’s largest renewable energy investors.
Roger Lloyd, chief executive of Palisade, said: “We are delighted to be announcing the launch of Intera at a time of unprecedented momentum within the energy sector.
“This momentum is being driven by a combination of the inevitable retirement of fossil fuel generation, coupled with ambitious net zero targets across the Australian economy, requiring significant investment in renewable energy generation, storage and transmission.
“Palisade’s extensive track record combined with the scale of its existing portfolio, positions Intera to take advantage of the intrinsic growth opportunities created by this thematic, while continuing to provide investors with stable high-quality income returns through the platform.”
In establishing Intera, Palisade has executed a A$1.3bn single portfolio financing facility secured against the combined pool of Intera assets, replacing existing individually financed asset level debt.
The new portfolio facility leverages the highly contracted and geographically diverse cashflows of the entity, to achieve superior financing terms and significantly enhanced flexibility to utilise debt funding for strategic purposes, according to the investor.
Intera will be owned by Palisade’s Renewable Energy Fund (PREF), Palisade’s Diversified Infrastructure Fund (PDIF), Palisade direct investment clients, HESTA and the Clean Energy Finance Corporation (CEFC), plus Aware Super, who will be a co-investor in Intera.
PREF will have approximately 50% ownership interest in Intera Renewables and has a mandate to invest in both operating and development phase renewables assets in Australia.
The fund aims to provide investors with diversified exposure to assets across locations, technology and offtaker.
Intera’s seed assets are comprised of Hallett 1 Wind Farm (South Australia), Snowtown 2 Wind Farm (South Australia), Granville Harbour Wind Farm (Tasmania), Macarthur Wind Farm (Victoria) and Ross River Solar Farm (Queensland), for a combined installed capacity (100% basis) of ~1GW, and first 12-months EBITDA of ~$150m per annum on an Intera proportionately owned basis.