Norway wealth fund makes first investment in U.S. renewable energy assets

The flag of Norway. (pexels/Andreea Ch)

Norway’s sovereign wealth fund, the world’s largest, has made its first investment in renewable energy assets in the United States, buying a 33.3 per cent stake in a portfolio of 17 solar plants and five onshore wind power facilities, it said on Tuesday.

Norges Bank Investment Management (NBIM) will pay US$425 million for its equity stake, with a total enterprise value of the portfolio of about $2.6 billion, it said in a statement.

The assets were located in the United States, an NBIM spokesperson said.

British Columbia Investment Management Corporation (BCI) and Brookfield will each take a 33.3 per cent stake in the portfolio, which has a capacity of some 2.3 gigawatts (GW) of power, NBIM said.

BCI separately said the assets would be owned by the three groups through a jointly held company, Northview Energy, which could invest a further $1.5 billion of equity in additional assets in the United States and Canada.

(Reporting by Nora Buli in Oslo and Anna Ringstrom in Stockholm, editing by Terje Solsvik)