Warren Buffett, who is considered as the genius investments, purchased OCI’s solar power plants that are located in the U.S. This indicates that OCI’s solar power development project is recognized for its profitability and it increases position of OCI as a solar power developer. It is likely that this move by Warren Buffett will be advantageous for OCI to have its other plants purchased or attract investments.
OCI Solar San Antonio 6 LLC, which is a subsidiary of OCI, made a public announcement on the 19th that it finalized sale of Solar Power Plant 6 LLC. This power plant has total size of 110MW and it was sold for $384 million (452.9 billion KRW) by Alamo 6 Solar Holdings, which was established by Berkshire Hathaway Inc. that has Warren Buffett as its CEO in order to take over this plant.
According to foreign press and investment industries, Buffett focused on profitability of Alamo 6. It is predicted that this plant will provide electricity to CPS Energy for next 25 years and create stable profitability. Considering the unit cost of electricity and period of supply of electricity that were agreed upon by OCI and CPS Energy, profitability of this plant is outstanding.

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<Panoramic view of Alamo Project located in San Antonio, Texas>

OCI became the first country in South Korea to enter North America’s solar power markets by winning Alamo Project in 2012. It invested $1.6 billion in Texas and constructed and operating 400MW solar power plants in 4,000 acre which is equivalent to 1,600 soccer fields. According to build & cell strategy, it will gain profit by selling its power plants after they are done developing. This is a typical developing model for solar power plants.
OCI was able to profit about 10% of investments by selling shares of solar power plants with size of 317MW excluding Alamo 1, 2 (20% shares), and 4. It is likely that status of OCI as a solar power developer will increase even more through sale of its plants. Industries are interested on whether or not OCI will sell its other solar power plants that it currently possesses.
“OCI has expanded range of its business through solar power development project along with production of poly-silicon and was able to improve its financial structure through successful sale.” said a representative for OCI. “As Alamo Project was successfully concluded, we will be able to focus more on solar power development project in the future.”
Staff Reporter Choi, Ho | snoop@etnews.com