Germany's Pacifico Energy Partners and France's Eiffel Investment Group have launched a European joint venture (JV) to develop a portfolio of 300 MW agrivoltaic projects in Italy, along with battery energy storage systems (BESS).
Projects will mainly be located in Italy's Lazio region. There will be selective additions of storage systems to stabilize the grid. Operational solar projects will generate enough clean energy to cover more than 200,000 Italian homes.
"On all projects, agrivoltaic concepts (simultaneous use for both solar photovoltaic power generation and agriculture) will ensure the continuity of value-creating usage of the land for food production and farming, for instance by planting c.160,000 olive trees between PV module rows on one project site," stated the duo.
While Eiffel will finance the initial phase to obtain necessary permits and authorizations through bridge equity financing, Pacifico will contribute projects at mid-stage development. The latter will also carry out the development process till the projects are ready-to-build (RTB), post which the duo may sell the assets.
Eiffel said it will invest up to €20 million in the portfolio through its, institutional investors only, Eiffel Transition Infrastructure fund.
"This inaugural transaction for Eiffel Transition infrastructure will accelerate the deployment of additional renewable energy capacity by bringing much-needed equity in the early phase of the projects and leveraging Pacifico's strong experience of PV development," said Managing Director at Eiffel Investment Group, Pierre-Antoine Machelon.
Italy has dedicated €1.2 billion to support investments in agrivoltaics under its €191.5 billion Recovery and Resilience Facility (RRF) facility approved by the European Commission (see Italy's €1.2 Billion Agrivoltaic Scheme Approved).
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