Indian renewable energy firm Continuum Green Energy has secured a $150-million equity investment from Just Climate, a specialist investment firm established by former US Vice President Al Gore’s Generate Investment Management.
The clean energy company said the new equity investment will support Continuum’s continued deployment of wind-solar-hybrid energy generation and storage projects across India.
Continuum, founded in 2009 by Arvind Bansal and Vikash Saraf, has an operational and near-operational portfolio of approximately 2.2 gigawatts of wind and wind-solar-hybrid projects. It plans to execute a further 1.3 gigawatts in the next 24 months to meet the demand for renewable energy from its growing customer base.
The company’s energy projects help its customers decarbonise with clean, affordable, and reliable renewable energy, per the announcement. Continuum is backed by Morgan Stanley Infrastructure Partners.
Approximately 72% of India’s electricity currently comes from coal, with electricity demand expected to grow by 35% between 2019 and 2030, data cited by Continuum showed.
Despite an ambitious Government of India target of 500 gigawatts of installed electric capacity from non-fossil sources by 2030, there is a significant barrier to realising the target given the scale of private equity capital required for this immense transformation.
According to the announcement, Just Climate will invest in Continuum from its $1.5 billion Climate Asset Fund I, which was launched in 2023 to focus on industrial climate solutions.
Continuum is the first investment in India from Just Climate’s industrial decarbonisation fund and complements its portfolio of other industrial decarbonisation solutions in the US and Europe.
“Continuum’s deployment of renewable energy will help displace coal power generation, realising the type of significant greenhouse gas emissions abatement that we at Just Climate look for in our investments while also managing impacts on people and the planet,” said Tushar Kumar, a partner at Just Climate.
North Haven Infrastructure Partners I, a global infrastructure fund managed by Morgan Stanley Infrastructure Partners, had in 2012 invested $212.03 million in Continuum.
Continuum said the transaction builds on its recent $650 million bond issuance and previous financings from a host of institutional investors across its capital structure including equity, mezzanine, project finance, private credit as well as public bond markets.