ElectroRoute has entered the Japanese energy market with the signing of a power purchase agreement (PPA) between its sister company MC Retail Energy and a corporate buyer.
Under the solar balancing contract, which will be largely managed using Irish infrastructure and expertise, ElectroRoute will effectively enable the purchase of solar power by MC Retail Energy.
ElectroRoute will hedge the balancing cost for its sister company.
ElectroRoute said this agreement is potentially the first of several as Japan moves to meet 2030 and 2050 renewable energy targets.
ElectroRoute CEO and co-founder Ronan Doherty said: “Japan is the world’s third largest economy and has a particularly interesting energy market in that it deregulated significantly later than Europe.
“All told the demand is 34 times that of Ireland for example, and Japan is investing heavily in renewables which requires international expertise like that which we have deployed over the last decade to enable it reach highly ambitious climate commitments.
“We were delighted to support MCRE on this landmark corporate PPA.”
ElectroRoute announced it would enter the Japanese market in late 2020 with founding director Eamonn O’Donoghue relocating to Tokyo.
The company will leverage its ElectroRoute CORE IT platform based in Dublin, which uses “deterministic and machine learning forecasts” for solar sites to manage the balancing risk for the portfolio in the Japanese power market.
ElectroRoute provides trading services for a total of 1.4GW of energy assets.
O’Donoghue said: Japan is already a world leader in solar infrastructure, adding, “But this is the first time corporates are properly investing as the race is on to maximise all available renewable opportunities.
“We are anticipating a significant expansion of solar corporate investment as well as wind and our bespoke offering is exactly what our client base is telling us they require.”