Toronto, Ontario, and Calgary, Alberta, Canada (April 18, 2023) – Potentia Renewables Inc. (“Potentia”) and Greengate Power Corporation (“Greengate”) are pleased to announce the close of financing for the Paintearth Wind Project currently under construction in Alberta, Canada. The project is owned 75% by the Power Sustainable Energy Infrastructure Partnership (“PSEIP”) and 25% by Greengate, with Potentia developing the project on behalf of PSEIP. Paintearth is part of PSEIPs portfolio of almost one gigawatt of new renewable energy projects operating or in-construction in Western Canada and the third wind energy project successfully developed in partnership with Greengate.
KfW IPEX-Bank, together with the Canadian Desjardins Group, will provide the Project with C$250 million in construction and operational financing. This project is one of the first in Canada to include an Environmental, Social, and Governance (“ESG”) interest rate swap with the Desjardins Group. Power from the Paintearth Wind Project will be purchased by a subsidiary of Microsoft for a 15-year term.
“We are pleased to announce financing for the Paintearth Wind Project, and to participate in one of the first ESG swaps in Canada. This project supports the transition to a cleaner, more resilient energy system. We thank our development partners, Greengate, and our investors for their support and look forward to delivering energy from this project to the Alberta grid in 2024,”
– Ben Greenhouse, Potentia’s CEO.
“It has been a pleasure working with Potentia on this important project. Our long-time partnership with them has been very successful, with Paintearth Wind now being the third wind energy project successfully developed together. With construction underway and financing now in place, we’re excited for Paintearth Wind to soon begin producing clean electricity,”
– Dan Balaban, Greengate’s CEO.
When completed, Paintearth Wind will have an installed capacity of 190MW using 38 wind turbines manufactured by Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy. The project is located forty kilometres southeast of the town of Stettler, Alberta.
Osler, Hoskin & Harcourt LLP acted as legal counsel to the borrower during the transaction, with Blakes, Cassels and Graydon, LLP acting on behalf of the lenders.