Canadian Solar has raised ¥5.4bn ($47m) through a dual-tenor green bond placement to finance the 19.05MW Gunma Aramaki solar plant in Japan.
The placement was with Goldman Sachs Japan and has a maturity of one-and-a-half years and 20.3 years, representing the initial and extended tenor respectively within a single-tranche of bond, Canadian Solar said.
“This innovative tenor mechanism provides Canadian Solar with options to maximize the value of its investment while preserving long-term financing support for its solar power project,” the company added.
The project, which is located in Gunma prefecture, is expected to reach commercial operations in December.
Electricity generated by the plant will be bought by Tokyo Electric Power under a 20-year feed-in-tariff contract at the rate of ¥36 per kilowatt-hour.
Canadian Solar chairman and chief executive officer Shawn Qu said: “We are encouraged by the institutional investors’ response to our innovative bond offering.
“This successful offering paves the way forward for Canadian Solar to further issue green project bonds at low coupon rate in Japan.”
Image: Canadian Solar
