ACEN allots $18 million for solar farm in Bangladesh

MANILA, Philippines — Ayala-led ACEN Corp. is spending up to $18 million to bankroll a 70-megawatt (MW) solar project in Bangladesh as part of its aggressive expansion in Asia-Pacific.

ACEN, through ACEN Renewables International Pte. Ltd., will infuse the capital into IBV ACEN Renewables Asia Pte. Ltd., its joint venture with Singapore-based ib vogt (Singapore) Pte. Ltd.

The investment will be used to purchase the relevant project holding company and finance the necessary capital expenditure, ACEN told the Philippine Stock Exchange yesterday.

In April 2022, the listed energy platform of the Ayala Group signed an agreement with ib vogt Singapore for the construction and execution of large-scale solar power plants in Asia.

IBV ACEN Renewables Asia is expected to focus on shovel-ready projects in Bangladesh, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, Indonesia, Malaysia and other countries in the region, with a minimum target operational capacity of 1,000 MW.

ACEN intends to invest up to $200 million in equity into the joint venture in addition to debt funding under the terms of the deal to fast-track the rollout of renewable energy (RE) projects in Asia.

While the core strategy centers on strengthening their footprint in the Philippines and Australia, ACEN president and CEO Eric Francia earlier said they are eager to work with partners to explore opportunities beyond these core markets.

At present, ACEN has a portfolio of around 4.8 gigawatts of attributable RE capacity across the Philippines, Australia, Vietnam, Indonesia and India, on top of the recently signed agreements and competitive tenders worth around two GW.

As previously disclosed, the company plans to raise about $15 billion in fresh capital to quadruple its attributable RE capacity to 20 GW by 2030.

ib vogt Singapore, on the other hand, is an affiliate of Berlin-based solar firm ib vogt GmbH, which is focused on developing and delivering high-quality large-scale turnkey photovoltaic (PV) plants worldwide.

Currently, ib vogt has around 4.3 GW-peak of solar PV solutions built and under construction globally, with over 55 GWp worth of projects in the pipeline.