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News Release > Recurrent Energy Breaks Ground on 100-MW Sunflower Solar Project
Recurrent Energy Breaks Ground on 100-MW Sunflower Solar Project
04/22/2021
Largest solar project in Mississippi to create hundreds of local jobs and bring clean power to Entergy Mississippi customers
Canadian Solar Inc. (“Canadian Solar”) (NASDAQ: CSIQ) today announced its wholly-owned subsidiary, Recurrent Energy, LLC (“Recurrent Energy”), commenced construction on the 100 MWac Sunflower Solar Project located in Sunflower County, Mississippi. To support construction of the Sunflower solar project, Recurrent Energy recently closed debt financing totaling over $146 million, inclusive of construction loan and letter of credit commitments. The debt financing was provided by Norddeutsche Landesbank (“Nord/LB”) and Rabobank.
Sunflower is one of the first utility-scale solar projects to be constructed under a Build Transfer Agreement (“BTA”) in the United States. Recurrent Energy signed a BTA with Entergy Mississippi in 2018 designating the regulated utility to own the Sunflower solar project when it reaches commercial operation in early 2022. The BTA was approved via unanimous vote by the Mississippi Public Service Commission in April 2020.
“With the ongoing financing and construction challenges due to the pandemic, I am particularly proud that our team secured the necessary financing for construction and has executed on the ground to begin building what is expected to be the largest solar project in the Magnolia State. This demonstrates both the dedication and capabilities of our Recurrent Energy team and the strength of our trusted financing partners, Nord/LB and Rabobank,” said Dr. Shawn Qu, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Canadian Solar. “We are very pleased to be charging ahead on the Sunflower solar project and look forward to successfully developing and constructing the project, creating a seamless transition of ownership to our valued customer, Entergy Mississippi.”
The Sunflower solar project is expected to employ approximately 400 workers at peak construction, with 75% of those construction jobs expected to be filled by local skilled tradespeople from the area. The Sunflower solar project will create further economic benefits to the local community by providing local sales and property tax revenues to Sunflower County, as well as indirect benefits such as increased local spending on the service and construction industries. The project will use Canadian Solar’s high-efficiency modules. Once operational, the project will power more than 16,000 homes with low-cost, clean electricity, equivalent to displacing approximately 170,000 metric tons of CO2 per year or taking about 37,000 passenger vehicles off the road.
“The Sunflower Solar project is another important milestone in Entergy Corporation’s continued transformation of its power generation portfolio, meeting customers’ needs with clean, efficient sources of electricity while maintaining some of the lowest retail rates in the country,” said Haley Fisackerly, Entergy Mississippi President and CEO. “Entergy’s investments in its generation portfolio transformation have resulted in substantial reductions in the company’s greenhouse gas emissions and provided significant savings to customers from lower fuel costs. Along with being able to offer renewable energy to our customers once this project is complete, we’re pleased with the positive economic impact it will have on Sunflower County and the Mississippi Delta.”
In 2001, Entergy was the first U.S. electric utility to voluntarily commit to capping greenhouse gas emissions. Since then, the company has renewed and strengthened its climate action goals several times. Most recently, Entergy announced its commitment to achieving net-zero carbon emissions by 2050. Learn more about Entergy’s leadership in creating a cleaner, more sustainable energy future at entergy.com/environment.
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About Canadian Solar Inc.
Canadian Solar was founded in 2001 in Canada and is one of the world’s largest solar technology and renewable energy companies. It is a leading manufacturer of solar photovoltaic modules, provider of solar energy and battery storage solutions, and developer of utility-scale solar power and battery storage projects with a geographically diversified pipeline in various stages of development. Over the past 19 years, Canadian Solar has successfully delivered over 52 GW of premium-quality, solar photovoltaic modules to customers in over 150 countries. Likewise, since entering the project development business in 2010, Canadian Solar has developed, built, and connected over 5.7 GWp in over 20 countries across the world. Currently, the Company has around 500 MWp of projects in operation, over 5 GWp of projects under construction or in backlog (late-stage), and an additional 14 GWp of projects in pipeline (mid- to early- stage). Canadian Solar is one of the most bankable companies in the solar and renewable energy industry, having been publicly listed on the NASDAQ since 2006. For additional information about the Company, follow Canadian Solar on LinkedIn or visit www.canadiansolar.com.
About Recurrent Energy (Canadian Solar Subsidiary)
Recurrent Energy is a leading utility-scale solar and storage project developer, delivering competitive, clean electricity to large energy buyers. Based in the U.S., Recurrent Energy is a wholly owned subsidiary of Canadian Solar Inc. and functions as Canadian Solar’s U.S. project development arm. Recurrent Energy has approximately 5 GW of solar and storage projects in development in the U.S. Additional details are available at www.recurrentenergy.com.
About Entergy
Entergy Mississippi, LLC provides electricity to approximately 456,000 customers in 45 counties. Entergy Corporation (NYSE: ETR) is an integrated energy company engaged in electric power production, transmission, and retail distribution operations. Entergy delivers electricity to 3 million utility customers in Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas. Entergy owns and operates one of the cleanest large-scale U.S. power generating fleets with approximately 30,000 megawatts of electric generating capacity, including 8,000 megawatts of nuclear power. Headquartered in New Orleans, Louisiana, Entergy has annual revenues of $10 billion and more than 13,000 employees. Learn more at entergy.com and follow @Entergy on social media.
Safe Harbor/Forward-Looking Statements
Certain statements in this press release are forward-looking statements that involve a number of risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially. These statements are made under the “Safe Harbor” provisions of the U.S. Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. In some cases, you can identify forward-looking statements by such terms as “believes,” “expects,” “anticipates,” “intends,” “estimates,” the negative of these terms, or other comparable terminology. Factors that could cause actual results to differ include general business and economic conditions and the state of the solar industry; governmental support for the deployment of solar power; future available supplies of high-purity silicon; demand for end-use products by consumers and inventory levels of such products in the supply chain; changes in demand from significant customers; changes in demand from major markets such as Japan, the U.S., India and China; changes in customer order patterns; changes in product mix; capacity utilization; level of competition; pricing pressure and declines in average selling prices; delays in new product introduction; delays in utility-scale project approval process; delays in utility-scale project construction; delays in the completion of project sales; delays in the process of qualifying to list the MSS subsidiary in the PRC; continued success in technological innovations and delivery of products with the features customers demand; shortage in supply of materials or capacity requirements; availability of financing; exchange rate fluctuations; litigation and other risks as described in the Company’s SEC filings, including its annual report on Form 20-F filed on April 28, 2020. Although the Company believes that the expectations reflected in the forward-looking statements are reasonable, it cannot guarantee future results, level of activity, performance, or achievements. Investors should not place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements. All information provided in this press release is as of today’s date, unless otherwise stated, and Canadian Solar undertakes no duty to update such information, except as required under applicable law.
