Petronas in talks to acquire assets of Acme Solar

MUMBAI: Malaysia’s state-run oil and gas company, Petroliam Nasional Bhd (Petronas), is in talks to buy about 100 MW of solar assets from India’s Acme Solar, two people aware of the development said. The assets located in Karnataka will be valued at Rs 450-500 crore. In February, Acme had sold about 600 MW assets to UK-based private equity fund Actis for Rs 3,000 crore.

Petronas is likely to acquire the assets through its Indian unit, Amplus Energy Solutions.

An Acme spokesperson declined to comment, while mails sent to a Petronas spokesperson and Amplus chief executive Sanjeev Aggarwal did not elicit response till press time Tuesday.

One of the largest solar power developers in India, Acme Solar has a portfolio of 5.5 GW with an operational capacity of 2.9 GW and 2.6 GW of projects under different stages of development.

Petronas had acquired Amplus in April 2019 from New York-based I Squared Capital. The company, which provides clean energy to its clients by setting up both on-site solar projects (rooftop and ground-mounted) and off-site solar farms, owns and manages a portfolio of 650 MW of operational and under-construction solar assets in India. It has about 180 commercial and industrial customers including Yamaha, Cisco, Reckitt Benckiser, Shlumberger, Carlsberg, ABB, TVS, and government entities such as Indian Railways, Delhi Metro, CPWD and HAL.

Petronas was among the contenders for acquiring a 20% stake in Hero Future Energies — the renewable energy arm of the Hero Group.

The stake was sold to Abu Dhabi-based energy company Masdar Clean Energy last year.

Another solar power producer, Azure Power Global, has kept its 400 MW of projects in Rajasthan and Assam up for sale. KKR, Actis, Edelweiss Infrastructure and Ayana Renewable Power are in early talks to acquire the assets, ET reported on May 16.

India has a target of having 450 GW of renewable energy by 2030. As of December 2019, 86 GW of this has been achieved.

Moody's Investors Service noted that India’s power demand would contract significantly in fiscal 2021.