Global investment manager Quinbrook Infrastructure Partners raised $3 billion (£2.3 billion) at closing of its Net Zero Power Fund (NZPF).
The NZPF, Quinbrook’s fifth successive energy transition-focused fund, pursues specific themes, including large scale solar and storage, sustainable infrastructure solutions for hyperscale data center customers, renewable fuels production, synchronous condensers for grid support, and strategically located contracted battery storage.
The fund attracted new institutional investors from the US, Canada, Australia, the UK, Sweden, Norway, Finland and the EU.
“This successful closing – Quinbrook’s largest to date – is a demonstration of the confidence our investors have in our differentiated investment strategies around project development, asset creation and business platform growth coupled with active asset management,” said David Scaysbrook, co-founder and managing partner of Quinbrook.
Rory Quinlan, also a co-founder and managing partner, added: “The Net Zero Power Fund follows our successful Low Carbon Power Fund and Renewables Impact Fund, which enabled us to develop, build and operate some of the largest and award winning renewable energy, battery storage and grid support projects in the US, UK and Australia. We are grateful for the support we’ve received from our existing investors and welcome many new investors to Quinbrook from all over the world.”
Quinbrook has already invested and committed over half of the total committed capital to date across the portfolio, which includes the ‘Supernode’ project, a 250MW/500MWh battery storage system in Queensland, Australia.
Synchronous condensers and the National Grid
The only UK project that has received investment to date is Project Severn, a portfolio of two synchronous condensers located at Sellindge in Kent, England and Cilfynydd in South Wales. Synchronous condensers are used to provide zero-carbon inertia for the electricity network, ensuring stability in the UK. Currently, inertia is provided to the electricity grid using fossil fuel power stations, which need to be kept warm in case they are needed to provide extra power.
Contracts for the projects, which are in early stage construction, were awarded to Quinbrook in phase III of National Grid’s Stability Pathfinder Programme. Quinbrook expects to invest over £192 million in constructing the Severn Portfolio.
Once operational, Quinbrook says the assets will provide 8,326 MWs of inertia, representing 48.7 percent of the total procured by National Grid.
The Stability Pathfinder Programme was launched at the beginning of 2020 to source new forms of stability provision. Phase I and II also awarded Quinbrook synchronous condenser projects, including an installation at Rassau in South Wales.
