Planck Foundation




ENERGY FINANCE


ENERGY AS LEGAL


Energy harvesting facilities their main purpose is producing electricity and delivering that to someone (direct users or to the grid or a combination of these two). Thereby all facets of energy facilities can have different owners. The facility can have a different owner than the building of land it's build on. The outcome can be sold to someone. The main purpose of legal is ensuring the location of the investment. For example: a housing project can have different owners, but have one roof based PV energy harvesting facility. It's import that in the land registry this energy harvesting unit can be registered as isolated part of the property. If this is possible (in Holland it is) than a sale of a building doesn't effect the energy facility location, nor it location rent etc. This insuring of locations is very important for the finance of the business case: without good split ownership by location insuring legal, financing energy harvesting facilities on not fully owned objects/soil is not possible. Legal makes it possible to have difference parties as land/building owner (property ownership legislation), facility owner (rental legislation), facility beneficiary (power output legislation). Energy is Legal is a very valid statement. Energy as Legal is about legal tools to building one single energy case with different market parties and insure the specific rights of all these parties (for each other, to each other, in protection to each other). It's about insuring location rights and output rights. Separation and insuring rights is something that's crucial for giving Energy Finance any traction. Good finance is based on a good legal foundation. Location rights by legalize/register the split of ownership and output rights by legalize/register the rights on output. Energy as Legal makes it possible to divide the rights of landlords and buildingowners, from those who own the energy facility, from those who has taken the output as collateral or ROI. It's about ensuring the rights of land/building owners (property ownership legislation), facility owners (rental legislation), facility beneficiaries (output collateral). It gives each party both rights/benefits and obligations. It's about the ensuring the place (land or building) of energy harvesting facilities, so the energy production will be continued regardless the current status or identity of the land/building owner. This calls for a change in property legislation. In Holland this is already take care of by property register legislation. In the land register installations build on the soil or on a building can be registered as a sovereign fixed right additional attached to this soil/building. This insures for free the existence of the facility location without the need to have ownership of the soil or building. This property attached facility gives the energy facility on third party property a legal status and thereby supports energy finance severely. It insures that the facility will be there regardless the ownership of the (land or building) property. This collateral record gives the energy output collateral a legal status and thereby supports energy finance severely. The second needed legal facility is a collateral record into the energy facility register. This should not be attached to the local/regional/national land registry, but attached to the local/regional/national grid operator, as this register already has a registration database of energy facilities. Adding a collateral record to this energy facilities register is simple. This collateral record gives the energy output collateral a legal status and thereby supports energy finance severely. Energy as Legal is a concept capable of generating a massive energy transition investment wave.


Author: Gijs Graafland


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