Brazil's Northeast Bank lifts limit for energy financing

Wind farm in Brazil. Author: Otávio Nogueira. License: Creative Commons, Attribution 2.0 Generic

January 12 (Renewables Now) - The Brazilian Northeast Bank (Banco do Nordeste) announced on Thursday that it is increasing its finance limit to 80% of the cost for energy projects, which comes as good news for renewables.

National Wind Energy Association (Abeeolica) president, Elbia Silva Gannoum, said this news comes at the right time, with two major tenders concluded in December.

Brazil awarded 674.5 MW of renewables supply contracts in the A-4 tender, including 574 MW for solar, and a further 3,841.6 MW of clean power supply contracts in the A-6 tender, including 1,386.6 MW for wind. Representatives of the winners were present during the announcement. There they learned about the composition of the new rates of the Constitutional Financing Fund of the Northeast (FNE) and the conditions for access to credit.

According to BNB president Romildo Rolim, this move by the bank will directly contribute to the growth of renewable energy in the region. The executive also announced that for 2018 the bank has BRL 27 billion (USD 8.4bn/EUR 6.9bn) in the budget of the FNE, of which about BRL 13 billion are exclusively for infrastructure projects.

(BRL 1 = USD 0.311/EUR 0.258)

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