Equity and cash fund acquisition of solar parks

Transeastern Power Trust, a Toronto-based investor in renewable energy assets chiefly in Romania and Eastern Europe, said it closed the previously announced acquisition of two photovoltaic plants in Romania and a CAD 5 million (EUR 3.44 million) secured debt facility provided by Sprott Resource Lending Partnership. The aggregate purchase price (net of assumed debt) for the solar companies is EUR 9 million, Transeastern’s press release said. The deal was partly funded by a transaction from July 24 in which RG Renovatio Group Limited of Cyprus acquired a 26.65% share in the Canadian entity for EUR 4.68 million, the document said. Most of the remaining funds are cash.

The solar plants have been in production for over two years with a total capacity of over 16 MW, the press release said.

J. Colter Eadie, chief executive officer of Transeastern, commented: “The acquisition of these two projects has been transformative for the trust. We have more than doubled our installed power production capacity on a basis that we expect to be immediately and highly accretive to the trust and dramatically lowered our projected payout ratio. We anticipate that approximately half of our power generation will now come from solar. This diversification reduces our exposure to hydrology, and de-risks our entire operation.”

Transeastern’s officials had said earlier this year they were focusing on Eastern Europe’s markets for lower multiples of cash flow and much higher returns than in the continent’s west. The strategy laid out for the public-traded investor included diversifying from hydro with solar and wind. Transeastern went public in May last year. It has direct and indirect subsidiaries in Canada, the Netherlands and Romania.