GUELPH, ON, April 22, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- 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.
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 15 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 19, 2021. 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.
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SOURCE Canadian Solar Inc.