Renewable Energy

 

Chadbourne is one of the most visible U.S. law firms in the renewable energy market. The Firm has worked on wind farm transactions both in the United States and abroad and has been tapped in some capacity by most of the major U.S. wind developers. Chadbourne is one of about a half-dozen law firms that are the dominant players in the U.S. market. For example, Chadbourne: acted for PPM Energy on “monetizations” of portfolios of U.S. wind farms, including the largest such transaction to date in the U.S. market;  closed on the first deal to use a prepaid “service contract” structure for a power project; represented GE Energy Financial Services, Wachovia, Wells Fargo Bank and Fortis Capital Corporation as equity investors in various projects; worked on the development side on more than 5,000 megawatts of wind farms in the United States (in a market with an installed capacity of 13,885 megawatts); and  was engaged as counsel in 17 or 18 tax equity deals last year in the U.S. market.

Download a copy of Chadbourne's Global Renewable Power brochure.

Internationally, Chadbourne lawyers worked on the financings for two groundbreaking wind farms in the United Kingdom, on acquisitions of wind farms in Germany and Holland, and on projects in Poland as well as in other countries in Europe. Wind Lawyers in the practice have published more than 50 pages of articles on legal, tax and regulatory issues in wind projects in the Project Finance NewsWire in the last four years. Chadbourne lawyers are frequent speakers at major wind conferences. Solar Solar energy is the most rapidly growing segment of the renewables market. Chadbourne worked for most of the major U.S. solar developers during the first wave of interest in solar in the 1980s and is at the center of the resurgent solar deal flow today. The Firm wrote a Guide to Federal Tax Incentives for Solar Energy that has been widely circulated in the industry and is available for free on the website of the Solar Energy Industries Association. Clients in the solar market include a large number of companies — both developers and equity investors. The Firm is currently working on almost two dozen active solar projects, including both photovoltaic and concentrating solar power. Hydroelectric Chadbourne acted for the developers of the high-profile 250-megawatt Bujagali hydroelectric project in Uganda and is engaged currently on a similar project in Tanzania, and has worked on other prominent projects in Chile, Brazil, Ecuador, Bolivia, Panama, Honduras, Nepal and Tajikistan.  Chadbourne represented the developer in two prominent hydroelectric projects in the United States — the Vidalia project in Louisiana and the New Martinsville project in West Virginia — and has worked on a series of smaller hydroelectric projects. In addition, Chadbourne acts as counsel to both trade associations for the ocean energy industry.  Geothermal Chadbourne has had a long association with geothermal energy, going back to the 1980s. It has worked for most of that time for Ormat, a prominent Israeli geothermal company; Chadbourne handled its initial public offering on the New York Stock Exchange in 2004. Other prominent geothermal clients include Unocal, MidAmerican Holdings, Calpine and U.S. Renewables Group. Landfill Gas Chadbourne has worked on more than 130 landfill gas projects and for most of the larger U.S. landfill gas producers. It also lobbied on behalf of the landfill gas industry on two occasions to extend tax credits for such projects.  Biomass Chadbourne has worked on a wide range of biomass projects in the United States and in the Caribbean basin, including hog fuel and black liquor boilers at paper mills and power plants that burn municipal solid waste, bagasse, rice hulls, peat, poultry litter, wood and other forms of biomass. It was engaged as counsel on 19 such projects during 2007. It has lobbied Congress and the Treasury Department on various issues tied to gasification of waste fuels.

Representative Experience