CIT finances Texas solar project

CIT group has announced its power and energy business has arranged $204.5 million in financing to support construction of Holstein Solar, a 200-megawatt solar farm to be built in Nolan County, Texas.

The project was sold by 8minute Solar Energy to Duke Energy Renewables.

8minute Solar Energy is based in Los Angeles and is the largest private solar and storage developer in the US.

The company has more than 14 gigawatts of solar and storage under development in California, the south-west, Texas, and the south-east, while also having brought more than two gigawatts of solar power plants into operation.

Duke Energy Renewables, a non-regulated unit of Duke Energy, operates wind and solar generation facilities throughout the US, with a total capacity of 3,000 megawatts. Duke Energy is one of the nation’s top renewable energy providers – on track to own or purchase 8,000 megawatts of wind, solar and biomass energy by 2020.

CIT led a group of four other banks in arranging the Holstein Solar financing. Holstein is the third major solar project that CIT has financed in Texas in a little over a year.

Market research by Inframation has identified CIT as one of the top lenders for renewable energy projects nationwide.

Mike Lorusso, managing director and group head for CIT’s Power and Energy business, said: “We were pleased to work with both 8minute and Duke Energy Renewables to advance the Holstein project as we continue to grow our portfolio of clean energy financings across the US.”

Tom Buttgenbach, president and CEO of 8minute, added: “We’re convinced that large-scale solar power plants like Holstein Solar will become the dominant form of power generation in the future.

“We greatly appreciated the expertise of CIT’s Power and Energy team in arranging the financing for this exciting new project.”