Boulder, Colo.–based Scout Clean Energy, a portfolio company of Quinbrook Infrastructure Partners, has closed financing and equity commitments for the 180-megawatt Heart of Texas Wind Farm (HTX) in McCulloch County, Texas.
HTX is Scout’s third successful wind farm closing as an owner-operator, bringing its owned portfolio of wind generation to 700 megawatts, according to Michael Rucker, CEO and founder of Scout.
Scout secured $255 million in construction financing, including letters of credit, from KeyBank, Rabobank and CoBank, ACB. GE Energy Financial Services provided wind turbine technology and committed a portion of the tax equity financing for the project, as it has done for the other scout projects.
HTX is RES’s 32nd renewable energy project in Texas, bringing the company to 4,000 megawatts of clean energy provided to the state, according to Graham Reid, CEO for RES Americas.
Scout recently acquired HTX from Renewable Energy Systems Americas, which originally developed the project as part of the second phase of the Rattlesnake Wind Farm, which commenced operations in 2018 and shares a transmission line with the HTX.
The project will utilize 64 of the latest generation GE 2-megawatt platform wind turbines. HTX utilizes three types of 2-megawatt platform turbines, each with different nameplate capacity and rotor size to optimize site production. It aims to provide zero emissions renewable power for thousands of homes in the Texas market.
HTX has secured an offtake contract with Allianz Global & Specialty's Alternative Risk Transfer unit, in partnership with Nephila Climate. In addition, McCulloch County stands to receive approximately $36 million in tax revenue over the life of the project.
"Heart of Texas is another important step in our rapid growth as a leading U.S. wind developer, owner and operator, and we expect to announce the closing of several more projects in the coming year,” said Rucker.
The wind farm is expected to commence operations by April 2020.
