Aquila Capital, one of Europe’s leading independent alternative asset managers, has acquired Norway’s second-largest operator of small-scale hydropower plants on behalf of institutional clients that include Dutch pension fund ABP and German insurance companies. The financial terms of the investment are not being disclosed.

Aquila Capital has completed the acquisition of Norsk Grønnkraft AS, an operator of 33 small-scale facilities located in central and southern Norway, from owners Akershus Energi, Energiselskapet Buskerud, E-CO Energi and Østfold Energi.

“This is one of the largest acquisitions of a small-scale Norwegian operator and shows how Aquila Capital has established a hydropower platform of scale in Norway since the first investment there in 2011," said Oldrik Verloop, co-head of Hydropower at Aquila Capital. "We aim to increase our production volume in Norway during the next five years to over 1,000 GWh.”

Norsk Grønnkraft owns and operates a regionally diversified portfolio of 33 small-scale hydropower plants, generating c. 210 GWh per year. The average age of the facilities is eight years. Through a bilateral agreement with NGK Construction, Norsk Grønnkraft’s former sister company, Aquila Capital is looking to add further generating facilities to the Norwegian hydropower platform.

The acquisition of Norsk Grønnkraft AS is the third investment in Norwegian hydropower by Aquila Capital for its clients. It follows the July 2014 acquisition of a 33% stake in Tinfos AS, an operator of two large-scale and nine small-scale runof-river hydropower facilities, by a partnership between Aquila Capital and APG, the investment
manager that acts for ABP. In June 2011, funds advised by Aquila Capital also acquired 33% of Jørpeland Kraft AS, which operates two run-of-river installations in the vicinity of Stavanger in western Norway.