The projects take the total solar capacity Acwa Power has won in Saudi Arabia to 10GW

Acwa Power has announced that three solar (PV) projects with a total combined capacity of 4,550MW in Saudi Arabia have satisfied the conditions precedent for senior loans drawdown.

The Riyadh-headquartered utility developer and its partner, Water & Electricity Holding Company (Badeel), signed the power-purchase agreements with Saudi Power Procurement Company (SPPC) to develop and operate the three projects in May last year.

The three projects, located in the central and northern regions of Saudi Arabia, include:

Ar-Rass 2: 2,000MW

Saad 2: 1,125MW

Al-Kahfah: 1,425MW

The projects together cost an estimated SR12.8bn ($3.4bn).

According to Acwa Power's recent bourse filing, the banks that agreed to provide senior debt financing of SR8.6bn ($2.3bn) for the projects include:

Banque Saudi Fransi (local)

HSBC (UK)

Mizuho Bank (Japan)

Riyad Bank (local)

Saudi Awwal Bank (local)

Saudi National Bank (local)

Standard Chartered Bank (UK)

The financing duration is 27.75 years. The project debt financing amount is non-recourse to Acwa Power, which owns a 50.1% equity in the three projects.

Its partner, Public Investment Fund (PIF) subsidiary Badeel, owns the remaining 49.9% equity in the projects.

MEED reported in June 2023 that the developer team expects to have the financing in place for the projects by last year.

The three projects take the number of solar PV contracts awarded by PIF under the kingdom’s National Renewable Energy Programme (NREP), to five.

It awarded contracts for the development of the 1,500MW Sudair solar PV in 2021 and the 2,060MW Shuaibah 2 solar PV in 2022.

Badeel is a wholly owned subsidiary of PIF, which is mandated to develop 70% of the NREP’s target capacity through the so-called price discovery scheme.

The PIF also owns a 44 per cent stake in Acwa Power.

Acwa Power has not disclosed the levelised electricity cost for the latest three schemes.

Based on MEED data, the three projects take the total number of solar PV contracts being developed by an Acwa Power-led team in Saudi Arabia to 10. These projects have a total combined capacity of 10GW.