Energy Press in Greece interviews Carlo Toic, SOL-R's COO
- Jan 14, 2025
- 4 min read
Updated: 4 days ago
ENGLISH ■ 14 JANUARY 2025 ■
SOL-R Global Infrastructure brings to Greece new land ownership regime ‘hosting’ RES stations
Chief Operating Officer Carlo Toic offers details on SOL-R Global Infrastructure’s new land ownership regime
Can you please describe what SOL-R Global Infrastructure (SGI) does?
SGI buys land under critical infrastructure like solar farms, BESS or datacenters. We are a landlord with a focus on assets rented to a specialized group of tenants. We never operate the assets themselves because we have a policy not to compete against our tenants. We are just holders of the land which is rented to infrastructure operators. Actually, we have coined a terminology for this: CIGS, for Critical Infrastructure Ground Site. This is the only thing that we do : we buy and subsequently lease out CIGS.
What value do you bring to developers?
Developers are regularly confronted with landowners who express a strong desire to sell rather than to rent. Usually this is because there is a clear tax advantage to sell (the sale proceeds are exposed to low or nil capital gains tax whilst the rental income is exposed to high income tax rates) or because they have no heirs that are interested in the land. In such case, we come in hand-in-hand with the developer and engage in two simultaneous transactions : on the one hand, we sign a preliminary purchase agreement with the landowner and on the other hand we sign a preliminary lease agreement with the developer. This is a win-win: the developer secures the land without paying for it and the owner secures liquidity of his asset.
Do you also deal with energy producers?
Yes, we also deal with IPPs and utilities. Especially with regards to the land they already own on their balance sheet. To energy producers, we offer the possibility of selling to us their land portfolio. We then lease it back to them over the long term. IPPs are interested in these transactions because it enables them to raise funds and delever their balance sheet and to pass on to someone else, in this case SGI, a nondepreciable asset. They have the added advantage of now having a single professional landlord under their solar farm, which avoids issues around messy inheritance or multiple family members who are misaligned. This will become increasingly relevant as these assets near their repowering stage.
What about landowners?
Any landowner with a plot of land currently under a lease agreement with a solar park should speak to us. By selling its land to us, the landowner gets immediate liquidity for an asset that is otherwise blocked for the duration of the lease. This can be very helpful for estate planning for example. Or it can allow the landowner to receive money which is then re-invested in new farming equipment or a more liquid asset class. In addition, landowners who sell to us can benefit from an advantageous tax rate on the capital gain they realize.
Can you give us a practical case study of how you work?
A typical case study is as follows: a developer calls us because the landowner wants to sell the land that was identified by the developer as the site for a future solar farm. Usually, the developer has already engaged quite intensely with the owner and a price has been reached for the acquisition of the land. We step in, conduct our due diligence on the land and the project, negotiate a rental amount commensurate with the purchase price of the land and go to the notary to sign both the preliminary purchase agreement with the owner and the preliminary lease agreement with the developer. The whole process can be wrapped up in 3 months.
What assets are of interest to you and what assets are not ?
In the solar industry, we focus on utility-scale solar farms (with or without BESS) and on standalone BESS. Utility-scale for us means land plots in excess of 5 hectares. We also deal with other types of assets like biomethane, desalination plants, datacenters, green
hydrogen plants… etc. Assets which we do not handle are roof-mounted solar operations, small ground-mounted solar farms, wind farms or raw land which we would need to acquire speculatively, i.e. without a proper infrastructure project being planned for it.
What are the main obstacles you encounter in your investments?
Every acquisition is different but, when there are issues, they tend to fall into 2 categories. Category n°1 is land/title issues. The ownership of the land is unclear or disputed. Or, if there are multiple owners, some are keen to sell, others are not. We can generally find solutions to these problems but it requires extra notarial and legal work. Category n°2 is price issues. In some cases, land prices are high in a way that makes the rent we would require too high for the solar farm’s profitability. Generally, there are no solutions to this issue.
Where do you currently stand in your development ?
SGI has grown fast in the past year. We are now in 7 countries in Europe: Greece, Cyprus, Portugal, Spain, Italy, Germany, Poland. In 2025, we are planning to start operating in 3 additional countries: the UK, France and Romania. We plan on deploying approximately 40 to 50 million euros in Greece and Cyprus over the next 3 years.
SGI’s Founders and Local Presence
