Zen Energy garners $54m in fresh debt funding

Joint managers of the raise, Hesperia and Income Asset Management, were said to tip in a significant amount themselves, according to the Australian Financial Review, but the financial publication did not reveal more details on these amounts, beyond the information that it is the part of a larger sum of $150 million for upcoming projects.

Zen Energy was founded almost two decades ago, and in 2015 the company’s board gained economist and energy expert Ross Garnaut. The company merged with Sanjeev Gupta’s SIMEC Energy in 2017, although the arrangement was short lived. The name of Garnaut however, has remained, with an executive lineup that now also includes Anthony Garnaut as the chief executive, Glenn Garnaut, as the chief risk officer.

In June just passed, the Queensland government granted $7 million to the Barcaldine Renewable Energy Zone (REZ) where Sunshot and its sister company Zen Energy are responsible for supplying renewable energy to tenants with a feasibility study outlining plans for 80 MW of wind and 90 MW of solar energy to be developed as demand increases and the industrial park grows.

Just the month before, Zen Energy penned a long-term deal with Greek resources and renewables company Mytilineos to purchase power from its Wagga Wagga South Solar Farm in New South Wales.

While the beginning of this year saw Zen Energy announce plans to develop its first utility-scale battery energy storage system after acquiring the 111 MW/270 MWh Templers Battery project in South Australia from UK-based developer Renewable Energy Systems Group.

Zen Energy contracts electricity from 20 solar and wind farms across Australia. It has installed 35,000 renewable energy systems and counts the South Australian government and CSIRO’s NSW sites among its clients.