Korean chemical conglomerate OCI Holdings sold another solar project in Texas, marking the third such transaction this year as the company accelerates asset sales to capitalize on strong demand for renewable energy developments.
OCI Holdings announced on Aug. 18 that its U.S. solar subsidiary, OCI Energy, completed the final approval process for the sale of the 100-megawatt (MW) “Lucky 7” project rights to Sabanci Renewables on Aug. 13. The Seoul-listed company did not disclose financial terms for the deal.
The transaction brings OCI Energy’s project sales to 480MW this year, following earlier disposals of the Sunflower and 120MW Pepper projects. An OCI Holdings official stated, “With the successful development and sale of three projects totaling 480MW this year alone, including Sunflower, Pepper, and Lucky 7, our U.S. solar business has entered a stable growth trajectory.”
The sale continues a pattern of Korean energy companies monetizing US solar assets as development costs rise and project timelines extend. OCI Holdings has been developing solar projects through its San Antonio-based subsidiary while simultaneously investing $265 million (approximately 384 billion won) in domestic solar cell manufacturing capacity at its Mission Solar Energy facility.
Sabanci Renewables, the US arm of Turkish conglomerate Sabanci Holding, has been aggressively expanding its American renewable portfolio with backing from Istanbul-based parent company. The transaction marks the first collaboration between the companies with additional transactions under consideration.
The Turkish buyer now operates over 500MW of solar capacity in Texas and targets 3GW of renewable projects across the US by 2030. Located within the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) energy market – where we already operate the Cutlass II and Oriana projects – this addition will bring our total installed capacity to approximately 660MWdc.
For OCI Holdings, the asset-light strategy allows the company to focus capital on manufacturing while benefiting from development expertise. The company added, “In line with the AI data center construction boom concentrated in the Texas region, we plan to accelerate the development and sale of energy storage system (ESS) linked projects that can complement the intermittency of solar power.”
