TerraForm refinances wind farms in Uruguay

TerraForm refinances wind farms in Uruguay

Project & Infrastructure Finance Loans Debt Funds Energy Renewable Wind Uruguay

TerraForm Power, a renewable energy yieldco owned by Canada's Brookfield, has signed a 17-year, $204m loan package to refinance debt from two wind farms in Uruguay, LatinFinance has heard.

The yieldco got a $175m A/B loan through IDB Invest and a $29m loan from the state-owned lender Banco de la República Oriental del Uruguay (BROU).

IDB Invest used its own money and mobilized funds from the China Co-financing Fund for Latin America and the Caribbean for the A loan, while Japan's SMBC contributed to the B loan.

TerraForm will use the money to refinance debt from the Carapé I and Carapé II wind farms. The wind farms, which began operations in 2015 with 95 MW in installed capacity, still have an average of 19 years left on the long-term power purchase agreements with Uruguay's state-owned power company UTE, according to information from Saeta Yield, a Madrid-based subsidiary of TerraForm.

Saeta bought the two wind farms from Argentina's Corporación América and Spain's Grupo San José for $65m in January 2017. Brookfield acquired Saeta last year for $1.2bn. Brookfield took control of TerraForm from SunEdison in 2017 and increased its stake to 65% in June last year.

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