Indian private sector lender Yes BankBSE -0.59 % is betting big on clean energy sector in India, as it has jointly invested $400 million with European Investment Bank (EIB), a long-term lending institution of the European Union, in new solar and wind projects in the country.
The bank is also exploring investments in the electric vehicle segment, officials said. “The new financing programme will streamline financing for a range of renewable energy projects being built and operated by leading Indian corporations and private sector developers,” the companies said in a joint statement on Tuesday.
“With this transaction we remain well on track to achieve our commitment to finance 5,000 MW of RE made at the 1st RE-INVEST Summit in Feb 2015 and is also synchronous with our COP 21 commitment of mobilising $ 5 billion for Climate Finance by 2020,” said Rana Kapoor, managing director of Yes Bank.
Yes Bank is exploring investment opportunities in the electric vehicle segments and has had preliminary talks with manufacturers in India, officials told reporters on the sidelines of the press conference held to announce the funding initiative.
“For electric vehicles it will be a bigger (investment) amount. Once we are comfortable in the renewable sector, then we are there across the value chain,” said Arun Agarwal, global head, international and institutional banking, Yes Bank.
The $400 million fund will look at financing large-scale utility projects in India and some of them have been identified in Rajasthan, Telangana, Maharashtra and Karnataka presently.
“Bulk of the activity is currently happening around solar, so the funding will be focussed there. We will be looking at utility scale projects,” Agarwal added.
“This new financing programme will make a significant contribution to harnessing wind power and solar energy to produce green energy, create thousands of jobs during construction and strengthen technical and financial skills for the renewable energy sector to expand,” said Andrew McDowell, EIB vice-president.
Yes Bank will manage the new co-financing programme for construction of new solar power plants and wind farms across the country.
Source: Economic Times