Banco Santander has created a company to acquire and invest in renewable energy projects in Spain that are in the development and construction phase, called Santander Green Investment, announced last week.
Through the new platform, the entity will take equity stakes in renewable energy companies. So far, Santander has acquired stakes in nine solar photovoltaic and wind power projects in Spain from different developers. The total capacity is approximately 500 megawatts, although the aim is to reach between 1 and 2 gigawatts.
Santander Green Investment, driven by the Corporate & Investment Banking (CIB) division, has an autonomous governance model and its investment committee has full powers to authorize investments. So this platform is provided with the necessary agility for decision-making in the current market environment.
The investment framework provides for the granting of the financial guarantees required during the processing of this type of project, as well as the association with promoters with proven experience in the development of renewable energy projects, the bank said in a note.
With this new tool, Banco Santander aims to help accelerate the development of renewable energy projects and boost investment in this type of asset.
Banco Santander mobilized a Renewable energy financing volume of €65.7 billion between 2019 and 2021. At the close of the last fiscal year, the Spanish entity was the world’s leading bank in financing renewable energy projects and had issued three green bonds for an amount of €3 billion.
The group chaired by Ana Botín has announced its ambition to achieve zero net carbon emissions by 2050 to support the goals of the Paris Agreement on climate change. To achieve this, it will align its power generation portfolio to the Paris Agreement by 2030. In addition, by that same year, it will have stopped providing financial services to power generation clients whose revenues are more than 10% dependent on thermal coal. By 2030, the bank will also completely eliminate its exposure to thermal coal mining worldwide.
