Morrison has agreed to sell a 50% effective interest in the Macarthur Wind Farm on behalf of the Commonwealth Superannuation Corporation ('CSC').
The investment will be acquired by funds managed by Palisade Investment Partners and First Sentier Investors.
The 420MW Macarthur Wind Farm comprises 140 wind turbines located near Macarthur in south-western Victoria. It is Australia's second largest operating wind farm.
Paul Newfield, incoming CEO of Morrison & Co said, "This has been an excellent renewable energy investment, delivering a great return since 2015 while generating clean energy to power over 181,000 homes in Victoria."
Alison Tarditi, Chief Investment Officer of CSC said, “As an early investor in renewables, we have been able to generate a very strong return for our customers from assets like the Macarthur Wind Farm. We expect that this asset will continue to play an important role in supplying renewable energy to Australia’s National Electricity Market. Our divestment enables us to recycle capital from a mature, operating asset into three renewable-development platform investments. In this way we continue to seek strong returns for our customers by creating significant new renewable energy capacity across solar, wind, hydro and biogas projects that contributes directly to the pace of energy transition.”
The Macarthur Wind Farm is fully contracted through to January 2038 under a 25 year offtake arrangement with a subsidiary of AGL Energy Limited, which operates and maintains the wind farm.
The transaction is subject to FIRB (Foreign Investment Review Board) approval and is expected to complete in early 2022.
ICA Partners acted as financial advisers for the transaction.