Octopus Energy’s generation arm makes its latest move into US renewables, with two investments to ramp up new solar power development in North America’s booming green energy market.
It marks the next move in Octopus’ $2bn plan to power up America’s green energy revolution and comes just three months after it made its first ever renewables investments stateside with the acquisition of solar farms in Ohio and Pennsylvania.
The new deal sees Octopus invest in solar farm developer Circal to rapidly scale their expansion. Circal, which is developing solar farms in the US and Ireland, has multiple Gigawatts of projects in its pipeline.
It is targeting the creation of 600 Megawatts of new solar farms in the US in the next five years, with a focus on Texas. This would be enough green power for 40,000 Texan homes.
UK-based Octopus-backed solar developer Zestec is now also setting up shop in the USA to build solar panels on commercial and industrial businesses’ rooftops and land.
Businesses like warehouses and logistics centres will be able to get solar panels installed by Zestec at no cost, allowing them to benefit from fixed prices and savings from harnessing the power of the sun.
Zestec is targeting sun-drenched Texas as well as the East Coast including Massachusetts, New York, and New Jersey to build new solar across hundreds of projects in the next five years.
These latest deals were made on behalf of the Octopus Energy Development Partnership (OEDP) and Sky (ORI SCsp) funds it manages.
These also build on Octopus’ work worldwide to turbocharge commercial rooftop solar and utility-scale opportunities.
It comes as the USA is speeding up the rollout of solar energy, installing a record 40 GW of solar in 2023*.
Zoisa North-Bond, CEO of Octopus Energy Generation, said: “The US continues to break its records with the amount of clean, cheap, solar power it is building. We entered America’s renewables market just three months ago and have big ambitions to build even more green power. With these latest deals we’re helping power up the clean energy revolution across the USA to create a cheaper and greener future.”
This is the latest in a string of deals Octopus Energy’s generation arm has made to accelerate the green energy transition in the US, including investments in Ocergy, floating offshore wind tech company in California, and nature projects startup Cultivo.
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