IPP Enlight Renewable Energy has announced the financial close of the 128MW solar and 400MWh battery energy storage system (BESS) Quail Ranch project in New Mexico, US.
Through Enlight’s US subsidiary Clenera Holdings, the company secured US$243 million in construction financing commitments for Quail Ranch.
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The project is expected to be completed near the end of 2025. Offtake agreements for both the solar generation and storage assets have been secured through a 20-year busbar power purchase agreement (PPA) with utility Public Service Company of New Mexico (PNM).
The US$243 million financing was led by BNP Paribas Securities Corp, Crédit Agricole, Natixis Corporate & Investment Banking and Norddeutsche Landesbank Girozentrale (Nord/LB).
Once the project reaches commercial operations, the construction loan is expected to convert into a US$120 million term loan.
Enlight says Quail Ranch will also be eligible for the Energy Community tax credit.
Quail Ranch’s development has been accelerated because it is an expansion of Enlight’s flagship Atrisco solar-plus-storage project, which reached full commercial operations in late November 2024.
Atrisco also has a 20-year busbar PPA with PNM and is Enlight’s largest project to date.
According to Enlight, Quail Ranch’s financial close, combined with the recent financial close of its Roadrunner and Country Acres projects, represents a total of US$1.5 billion in financing over the past four months with the same consortium of lenders.
The 290MWdc/940MWh solar-plus-storage Roadrunner project, also known as Apache Solar II, received a total financing of US$550 million, while the recently announced closing of Country Acres, the 403MWdc/688MWh project, received a US$773 million debt financing.
Enlight CEO Gilad Yavetz claimed that once Quail Ranch comes online by the end of this year the company’s three-project portfolio of operational assets, including Atrisco—which comprises 364MW of PV and 1.2GWh of battery storage—and the 105MW Apex solar PV project in Montana will between them will generate US$200 million in annual revenues.
In 2023, New Mexico’s state Senate passed a bill requiring investor-owned utilities to have 2GW/7GWh of energy storage online by 2034.
According to PNM’s 2023 Integrated Resource Plan (IRP), the utility’s existing resources and resources under development for 2025 represent a total generation capacity of 4,459MW.
Of this figure, Solar PV accounts for 1,618MW, natural gas for 1,002MW and energy storage for 682MW of installed capacity.
Notably, while energy storage and solar PV are expected to rise, wind, natural gas, coal and nuclear generation look to remain the same from 2023 to 2026.
PNM says it expects to retire ‘most or all’ of its natural gas plants by the end of 2039 and currently relies on the transmission system of the Four Corners Power Plant to deliver power from the northern part of the state to PNM’s service area.
By 2026, PNM expects its energy storage capacity to be nearly half of its peak demand of approximately 2,000MW.
