Project owner guide
Funding options for solar and battery storage projects
Most UK energy projects are funded in stages, with different capital at each one. This guide sets out the options, what each funder expects to see, and how to run a raise without giving away your project.
General information only, not financial, legal or tax advice.
The options
Six kinds of capital, and what each one is for
Cost rises with unresolved risk. The cheapest money arrives last, once the project can be modelled.
Development capital
Funds the work that makes a site fundable: land rights, grid application, surveys, planning. Expensive money in return terms, because most of the risk is still unresolved.
Equity
Investors take a share of the project or the company holding it. Dilutive, but it does not need servicing while the asset is pre-revenue.
Senior debt
Lowest cost, most conditional. Lenders want consent, a grid offer, a credible build contract and revenue they can model.
Mezzanine and bridging
Fills the gap between what senior debt will lend and what equity will put in, usually for a defined period.
Construction funding
Drawn against a programme and milestones. Contingency, contractor strength and the connection date drive terms.
Refinance, sale or JV
Once operating, an asset can be refinanced on cheaper terms, sold in whole or part, or contributed into a joint venture to release capital for the next project.
Running a raise
From position to funded conversation
A raise goes faster when the first document a funder reads already answers their first five questions.
01
Establish the position
Be honest about land, grid and planning status. Funders price uncertainty; they penalise surprises.
02
Decide what you are raising
Amount, instrument and what it buys — consent, connection, construction or a portfolio.
03
Assemble the evidence
Grid correspondence, planning documents, land agreements, yield or cycling analysis and a model whose assumptions are stated.
04
Publish a teaser
Give the market enough to self-select: technology, location, stage, scale, structure and a capital range. Keep detail behind approval.
05
Release detail deliberately
Answer itemised requests, then open a Deal Room only for counterparties worth spending time on.
Readiness
What funders ask for first
Not every item needs to be complete. Every item needs a clear status.
- Land option or lease
- Grid application or offer
- Planning status
- Yield or cycling analysis
- Capex estimate
- Revenue assumptions
- Delivery team
- Ownership structure
Status beats polish
A brief that marks an item as in progress or not yet established reads as competent, not weak.
One structure, every reader
Presenting the project the way funders already read projects shortens the first round of questions.
Keep the record together
Documents, requests and decisions attached to the project rather than spread across inboxes.
Pitfalls
Four things that stall raises
Each of these is avoidable, and each one costs weeks.
Raising before the position is clear
A raise launched without a grid or planning position generates questions you cannot answer, and burns the first conversations.
Estimating what is not established
A figure presented as fact and later corrected costs more credibility than an honest “not yet established”.
Sending everything to everyone
Full data packs circulated early leak commercial detail and give you no record of who saw what.
One instrument for every gap
Development, construction and operating stages want different money. Matching the instrument to the stage widens the funder pool.
Next step
Publish a brief and keep control of the detail
Create a Project Owner account, build a structured brief and decide exactly what the market sees.
Listing a project is free. WattFund reviews every brief before it is published.