Adani Green Energy to raise $1.8 bn from foreign banks

The company will raise $1.8 billion for the under construction and contracted portfolio of 12 GW, which includes the country’s first manufacturing-linked solar power plant of 8 GW.

Adani Green Energy Ltd (AGEL) is looking to tie up with close to a dozen foreign banks to avail greenfield funding for its under-construction assets.

The company will raise $1.8 billion for the under construction and contracted portfolio of 12 GW, which includes the country’s first manufacturing-linked solar power plant of 8 GW.

In a post results call, Vneet S Jain, MD & CEO, AGEL said the company’s total renewable portfolio stands at 14.6 GW of which 2.6 GW has been commissioned. “AGEL is in the process of tie-up of $1.8 billion facility to fund the under construction pipeline,” said Jain. 

AGEL reported a profit before tax of Rs 51.27 crore during the first quarter of FY21 ended June, as against loss of Rs 131.24 crore during the same period in FY20. The total income of the company during Q1FY21 rose to Rs 878.14 from Rs 675.23 crore in the same period last year.

Explaining the funding plans of the company, Sagar Adani, executive director, AGEL said, “We take construction financing from Indian banks and once they are operational, we refinance that portfolio with international bond funding. Going ahead, given the size and scale ahead of us, in addition to the Indian banks, we would have 10 international banks which are going to work with us for construction green field funding.”

He said this would help the company diversify its construction financial portfolio and all projects would be fully funded at the time of construction.

Adani said the tie-up with international banks would be a revolving construction facility.

“As soon as the projects are commissioned, they would be taken out from the international bond market and this facility would again be made available for the next tranche of assets,” he said adding that the firm's debt-to-EBITDA ratio would come down to 5.5 from 6 currently.

AGEL in its statement on BSE, said Adani Green Energy has progressed to become the largest solar power producer in the world, having won the world’s largest solar bid of 8 Gw. “With this, we have moved closer to our goal of commissioning renewable capacity of 25 GW by 2025,” said the statement.

AGEL recently won the country's first solar manufacturing tender of setting up 2 GW of solar cells and modules manufacturing and 8 GW of allied solar power plants.

Gautam Adani, chairman, Adani Enterprises in a LinkedIn post in January announced investing over 70 per cent of their budgeted capex of the energy vertical into clean energy and energy-efficient systems.