13 March 2019  |  Schiphol

DIF consortium reaches financial close on Walloon street lighting PPP

DIF is pleased to announce that, as part of the LuWa consortium, it has reached financial close on Plan Lumiere 4.0, an availability PPP project involving the modernisation and maintenance of the street lighting network across the Walloon region’s main roads.

The consortium consists of DIF Infrastructure V (70% equity stake), together with its partners Citelum, CFE and Luminus. The authority partner is the Société de Financement Complémentaire des Infrastructures (SOFICO), the public company established to finance the maintenance and upgrade of motorways and other main roads in the Walloon region.

The 20 year DBFM contract covers 2,700 km of roads and interchanges. The project includes the replacement of approximately 100,000 street lights by modern LEDs with dimming capability, as well as the installation of a remote monitoring and management system.

The modernisation program will reduce the energy consumption of the network by 76%, equivalent to a reduction in CO2 emissions of 166,000 tons over the life of the project, as well reduce the light pollution generated by the network. Furthermore, the project will enhance regional employment opportunities: 400 new jobs will be created and 100,000 professional training hours will be organized together with the regional employment agency.

Gijs Voskuyl, partner at DIF, added: “DIF is proud to invest in this innovative project, which incorporates significant technological and ESG improvements, to the benefit of road users, local communities and the environment.”

Total debt funding for the project amounts to €230 million secured from BBVA, Belfius, BNP Paribas, KBC, SMBC and Société Générale.

Advisers to the consortium are Belfius/BDO (financial), DLA Piper (legal), Tiberghien (tax & accounting) and Operis (model audit). Advisors to the lenders are Jones Day (legal), AECOM (technical) and Willis Towers Watson (insurance).

 

About DIF

DIF is an independent infrastructure fund manager, with €5.6 billion of assets under management across seven closed-end infrastructure funds and several co-investment vehicles. DIF invests in greenfield and brownfield infrastructure assets located primarily in Europe, North America and Australasia through two complementary strategies:

  • DIF Infrastructure V targets equity investments in public-private partnerships (PPP/PFI/P3), concessions, regulated assets and renewable energy projects with long-term contracted or regulated income streams that generate stable and predictable cash flows.
  • DIF Core Infrastructure Fund I targets equity investments in small to mid-sized infrastructure assets in the energy, transportation and telecom sectors with mid-term contracted income streams that generate stable and predictable cash flows.

DIF has a team of over 110 professionals, based in eight offices located in Schiphol (the Netherlands), Frankfurt, London, Luxembourg, Madrid, Paris, Sydney and Toronto. Please visit www.dif.eu for further information.

Contact:
Allard Ruijs, Partner
Email: a.ruijs@dif.eu

night time motorway sky shot