NextPower UK ESG (NPUK) is a vital cog in the UK’s Clean Power 2030 ambitions of delivering energy security and decreasing the country’s carbon output through increasing the amount of domestic green power production. The Fund provides investors attractive returns through stable cash flows from a carefully selected portfolio of new-build utility-scale solar PV assets in the UK with long-term contracted revenue streams. The fund made its first distribution to investors in September 2023 just 13 months after its launch.
NextPower UK ESG achieves another fundraising close exceeding target by 30%
The cornerstone investor into NPUK was the National Wealth Fund, contributing £250 million on a match-funding basis to drive private capital into new build renewables in the UK. NEC welcomed several new investors into NPUK over the fundraising period, including several local government pension pools, alongside international investors looking to access and capture the attractive growth landscape for new build solar PV in the UK through a specialist investment manager.
400 MW operating solar capacity in 2025
To date, NPUK has already deployed over 70% of its committed capital from investors and has recently acquired its fifteenth asset, raising NPUK’s portfolio capacity to 731MW. NPUK currently has 249MW of operating solar assets in the UK, including Llanwern solar farm, the UK’s largest operating solar asset.
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NPUK has a further 482MW of solar and energy storage projects in construction or ready-to-build, alongside further near-term acquisitions in its pipeline. The fund continues to make rapid progress in bringing online additional new-build solar and is on track to achieve over 400 MW of operating capacity this year. NPUK is expected to exceed 1GW of capacity when fully deployed, contributing significant progress towards Clean Power 2030 ambitions of trebling UK solar capacity in the coming five years.
UK attractive market for utility-scale solar
Michael Bonte-Friedheim, Group CEO and Founding Partner of NextEnergy Group , commented: “NextPower UK has been another success story for NextEnergy Capital and the wider NextEnergy Group in the backdrop of a difficult global fundraising environment. We raised £733 million and reached a final close nearly 50% higher than the fund’s initial target of £500 million.
NextPower UK clearly demonstrates the demand from investors for this type of strategy, run by a specialist investment manager with a significant track record of capital deployment into high-quality assets. I would like to thank both our existing and new investors across NextEnergy for their continued support and loyalty and in particular, thank our institutional and pension fund investors who committed to NextPower UK.
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The UK remains an attractive and deep market to deploy utility-scale solar and there is a significant opportunity through the UK’s clean energy ambitions for investors to capture this growth with the right execution partners. In anticipation of this, NextEnergy Capital (NEC) will be launching a new follow-on strategy, NextEnergy UK II, early this summer.”
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Stuart Nivison, Head of Portfolio Management at the National Wealth Fund, said: “Our cornerstone investment in NextPower UK was our first deal to leverage this scale of additional independent investment, and it is exciting to see their success story play out through this milestone fundraise. Today’s announcement perfectly demonstrates the impact our investments can have. Catalytic capital deployed by the National Wealth Fund going forward can help mobilise institutional investment into clean energy projects across the UK, driving growth and providing greater capacity to power homes and businesses.” (hcn)
