BlackRock Real Assets is to acquire an equity stake and inject more than US$100m (€85.1m) into Korean solar developement and investment company Brite Energy Partners.
Brite Energy is to use the capital to acquire and build small-scale solar assets in South Korea to deliver more than 350MW in power generation capacity.
It is the first BlackRock Real Assets investment in South Korea’s small-scale solar sector, and is being made on behalf of Global Power Renewable Fund III, which raised US$4.8bn earlier this year.
More than one-third of the fund’s capital has been earmarked for investments in climate infrastructure assets in Asia-Pacific
Charlie Reid, managing director of BlackRock Renewable Power, said Brite Energy’s “market-leading expertise combined with BlackRock Real Assets’ scale of capital will create a compelling force in the local solar market”.
Heeseong Brian Kim, CEO and founder of Brite Energy, said: “We are bringing together unrivalled industry expertise and insights, as well as financial capacity so far unmatched in the Korean solar industry.”
He said Brite Energy would use the funding from BlackRock to expand and become the nation’s leading solar aggregator and operator.
All projects developed and acquired by Brite Energy are expected to be fully contracted under 20-year agreements with subsidiaries of the state-owned Korean Electric Power Corporation (KEPCO) or Korean member companies of the Climate Group’s global RE100 initiative.
South Korea has set a target to reduce carbon emissions by 40% before 2030, and BlackRock expects to install 30GW of new renewable-power generation capacity in the country by 2025.
