Carnegie Clean Energy has signed a binding term sheet with government agency Indigenous Business Australia and the Perth Noongar Foundation for a 50 per cent stake in the renewable energy company’s $17 million Northam solar farm.
The 10-megawatt farm will comprise around 34,000 solar panels on a 24-hectare property, and is forecast to deliver about 24,000MW hours of electricity per annum.
Under the agreement, the two indigenous organisations will take a collective 50 per cent stake in the project with an aim to drive Aboriginal employment in the construction and operation of the farm.
The two organisations were selected following a competitive investment process run by Carnegie.
IBA is a government organisation focused on improving indigenous involvement in the business community while PNF is part of the Noongar Property Holdings and aims to provide economic benefits to the Whadjuk people in the Perth region.
Construction is expected to be complete in the second half of 2018 and Carnegie managing director Michael Ottaviano said it was an exciting project.
“This will be Carnegie’s second solar project that we own and operate and we’re delighted to be working alongside Indigenous Business Australia and the Perth Noongar Foundation as their first investment in renewable energy in WA,” he said
“The Northam solar project is a great step forward in Carnegie’s strategy of developing a mixture of customer owned projects that generate an immediate return at the completion of construction and self-owned projects that generate an annuity return over the life of the project.”
Carnegie has developed the solar farm as a template for future projects where the company can receive value from multiple revenue streams including electricity sales, renewable energy certificate sales and reserve capacity credit payments, a project development fee at financial close and a share of the operations and maintenance margins.
IBA chief executive Rajiv Viswanathan praised the new agreement.
“We are excited to be part of this ground-breaking solar initiative alongside our partners Carnegie and PNF,” Mr Viswanathan said
“This project is an example of the private and public sectors partnering with indigenous investors to promote impact investment.”
PNF chairman Cedric Jacobs said the foundation was proud to be a part of the project.
By Tayler Neale
