Banking on Renewables: Inside a Milestone Renewable Energy Deal

This case study describes a milestone renewable energy deal where Goldman Sachs became the first U.S. bank to sign a large-scale, off-site renewable energy power purchase agreement (PPA) to enable the development of a 68 megawatt (MW) wind farm in Pennsylvania.

• Goldman Sachs signed a power purchase agreement (PPA) to facilitate the development of a new 68 megawatt (MW) wind farm in Pennsylvania. This is noted as the first transaction by a U.S. bank to contract for the entirety of a new renewable energy project.
• The deal is part of a broader sustainability strategy that includes a target to reach 100 percent renewable energy for global electricity consumption by 2020 and a goal to provide $150 billion in clean energy financings and investments by 2025.
• Goldman Sachs selected a virtual PPA structure and located the project within the PJM grid in Pennsylvania to closely match clean energy generation with the location of its consumption and to manage power market risk.
• To manage commodity risks such as basis risk (price differences between the wind farm and consumption location) and shape risk (mismatches between generation and consumption profiles), the firm utilized the commodity risk management infrastructure of its J. Aron business.

APA

Porter, M. (2017). Banking on Renewables: Inside a Milestone Renewable Energy Deal. RMI. https://rmi.org/resources/banking-renewables-inside-milestone-renewable-energy-deal/

Chicago

Porter, Mark. Banking on Renewables: Inside a Milestone Renewable Energy Deal. RMI, 2017. https://rmi.org/resources/banking-renewables-inside-milestone-renewable-energy-deal/.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |last1=Porter |first1=Mark |title=Banking on Renewables: Inside a Milestone Renewable Energy Deal |publisher=RMI |date=30 June 2017 |url=https://rmi.org/resources/banking-renewables-inside-milestone-renewable-energy-deal/ |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{porter2017banking, author = {Porter, Mark}, title = {{Banking on Renewables: Inside a Milestone Renewable Energy Deal}}, institution = {RMI}, year = {2017}, month = jun, url = {https://rmi.org/resources/banking-renewables-inside-milestone-renewable-energy-deal/}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }