This will make Greenko India’s second-most valuable renewable power company after Adani Green Energy, which is currently valued at $10.2 billion (Rs 84,750 crore).
Hyderabad-based Greenko is 52% owned by GIC of Singapore. The founder duo — Anil Chalamalasetti and Mahesh Kolli — together own 12%, Abu Dhabi Investment Authority owns 14% while the rest is owned by Japanese major Orix Corporation.
The official announcement is expected as early as this weekend. The rights issue involving primary equity infusion will maintain the current shareholding structure in the company since all shareholders are participating. Greenko’s current operating portfolio is 7.3 GW from 114 projects spread across 15 states.
The company clocked $625 million in EBITDA (operating profit) in FY22 and is expected to close fiscal year 2023 at $650 million on revenues of $720 million. Greenko declined to comment.
CAPACITY EXPANSION
The funds will be used primarily to double the energy storage projects to 50 GWh from the present 25 GWh. The company is building the world’s largest Integrated Renewable Energy Storage Project (IRESP) in Andhra Pradesh’s Kurnool district with an investment of over $3 billion.
The company said this 5,230 MW IRESP will play a key role in India attaining energy security and enabling global energy transition. A key buyer of this power will be ArcelorMittalNipponSteel India.
According to Greenko, this 5.2 GW IRESP project is a first of its kind single location energy storage project with wind ( 550 MW) and solar ( 3,000 MW) capacities backed by pumped storage (10,800 MWh of daily storage) and will avoid 15 million tonnes of CO2 annually which is equivalent to emissions from three million cars. It’s also building similar energy projects in Karnataka, Maharashtra and Rajasthan.
Last month, the company said it would be investing Rs 10,000 crore to set up a Pumped Storage Project (PSP) near Gandhi Sagar in Neemuch District of Madhya Pradesh.
BONDS REPAID
ET reported on February 27 the company is extinguishing $1 billion of its outstanding bonds through a bridge loan and internal accruals and cash flows.
CreditSights, a unit of Fitch Ratings, on Tuesday said it maintains its outperform recommendation on Greenko Energy, owing to its strong shareholder backing, secured nature of its outstanding dollar bonds and an improvement in its balance sheet due to the backlog of payments coming in from the Andhra Pradesh discom.
CreditSights added that Greenko has ramped up its capex significantly, as its IRESPs require $2-bn investment through FY25 and are likely to burden its negative free cash flows further and necessitate additional debt incurrence.
ENERGY AS A SERVICE
Over the years from being a pure play utility player, Greenko has pivoted toward offering energy as a service, with storage solutions, pumped hydro helping in industrial decarbonisation. Greenko has now moved to green hydrogen and ammonia and then speciality complex chemicals. It has signed an MoU with German gas trader Uniper to supply green hydrogen from its upcoming Kakinada facility, starting 2025.
In 2022, it partnered with Singapore-based Keppel Infrastructure Holdings Pte Ltd (Keppel Infrastructure) to jointly produce at least 250,000 tonnes of green ammonia per year.
