Renewable power business, Push Energy, has secured £1.5 million funding to develop large scale, ground-mounted solar farms in the UK.
The Colchester-based firm, which has experience within the solar power market, is developing field-scale solar farms on carefully selected sites throughout the UK. The company is vertically integrated, with its subsidiary Push Build providing an in-house engineering design and procurement contractor (EPC) capability. This allows Push Energy to construct its own solar farms, thereby retaining control of the build process and ensuring quality of work.
To date, Push Energy has secured grid connections for approximately 300MW of sites, of which 20MW have so far received full planning approval.
The funding round was led by the Low Carbon Innovation Fund (LCIF), a venture capital fund managed by specialist energy and environment merchant bank, Turquoise International.
Stuart Bradshaw, CEO at Push Energy, comments: “We are very pleased with the funding we have received through the LCIF. The investment will enable us to develop more field-scale solar farms which will help play a substantial role in achieving the UK government’s renewable energy targets.”
Francis Wright, managing director at Turquoise International, which oversees the LCIF fund, adds: “Push Energy is a responsible renewable company that seeks solar farm sites by working in partnership local planners and landowners. The vertical integration allows the business to retain control over the whole process, ensuring complete quality control, and we wish them every success following this latest investment.”
LCIF is a venture capital fund which is managed by Turquoise International on behalf of the Low Carbon Group at the University of East Anglia and supported by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF). It has more than £20m of ERDF funding that will be combined with some £30m of private sector capital to generate more than £50m of low carbon investments.
About Turquoise International
Turquoise International is a merchant bank specialising in energy and the environment. Established in 2002, Turquoise offers in-depth industry knowledge and extensive capital raising, transaction advisory, and investment management expertise and track record.
For capital raising, our advisory clients are predominantly private companies or listed companies seeking funding via private placements across a range of business segments including technology, project development, manufacturing and services.
Turquoise assists clients in raising funds across the capital structure including equity and debt. We source funds for our clients from a diverse range of investors located in Europe and internationally.
Turquoise advises corporate clients and their shareholders on transactions such as mergers, acquisitions, disposals and joint ventures assisting in areas such as strategy, identification of opportunities, valuation and transaction execution
In fund management, Turquoise provides a range of services to investors, ranging from advice in relation to individual investments to discretionary investment management for a portfolio of investments.
Turquoise invests directly through Turquoise Capital (seed stage proprietary investments) and manages the Low Carbon Innovation Fund.