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OPIC Board Approves Financing for First Large-scale Solar Power Project in Peru |
Thursday, June 02, 2011 WASHINGTON, D.C. – The Board of Directors of the Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC) today approved $123 million in financing for the construction of two 20-megawatt solar power plants in Peru – the first large-scale solar power project in the country.
Using solar technology developed by a U.S. company, the project will sell all the electricity it produces to the national grid and thereby support Peru’s effort to diversify its sources of electricity generation.
The renewable energy project will involve the installation of advanced solar panel equipment – the first ground-mounted solar photovoltaic power generation system in Peru – on two separate sites in the rural Arequipa region of southwestern Peru. The project companies were awarded 20-year power purchase agreements by Peru’s Ministry of Energy and Mines.
The project will use ‘SunFab’ solar panel technology developed by Applied Materials, Inc., a California company which provides manufacturing equipment and services to the global semiconductor industry. Grupo T–Solar Global S.A., a Spanish company which purchased the SunFab production line, is the developer of the project.
“We are delighted to take part in a landmark development for Peru’s renewable energy sector – its first major solar energy project,” said OPIC President and CEO Elizabeth Littlefield. “The project will help Peru diversify its source of electricity, and will do so using solar technology developed by an American company. This is precisely the type of catalytic impact OPIC seeks to generate in the renewable energy sector globally.”
The U.S. sponsor of the project is Assured Guaranty Municipal Corp., a New York-based public finance and global infrastructure subsidiary of Assured Guaranty Ltd., a leading financial guaranty institution. The project is Assured Guaranty’s first transaction in the solar sector, and materialized due to OPIC’s participation. Assured Guaranty Municipal Corp. is expected, subject to closing conditions including internal credit approval, to provide a partial risk guaranty for the project.
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