JPMorgan, Brookfield see deals revival for clean energy assets

[SINGAPORE] Clean energy projects are poised for a revival in mergers and acquisitions (M&A) activity on the strengthening outlook for electricity demand and as expectations on asset valuations converge, according to some of the sector’s top dealmakers.

Executives at JPMorgan Chase, Brookfield Asset Management and Nuveen Infrastructure see potential for a fresh wave of project-level transactions as data centres and other industries offer new support for renewable energy, and with less uncertainty on energy policy, tariffs and interest rates than a year ago.

Asset owners have struggled to complete project sales in the past year and are increasingly prepared to lower their price expectations, while buyers are becoming more willing to pay for clean energy generation capacity.

“Expect more mergers and acquisitions for renewable assets in 2026 as developers or sellers of projects and companies become more realistic in terms of valuation,” said Greg Zdun, JPMorgan’s Asia-Pacific head of energy transition and natural resources.

The sector largely missed out on a banner year for global M&A in 2025, when the overall value of transactions topped US$4.5 trillion and marked the second-best tally on record.

Across solar, wind, and energy storage, completed acquisitions of individual assets or project portfolios totalled 55.3 gigawatts of generation capacity last year, the lowest total since 2017, according to data compiled by BloombergNEF. The value of completed company-level deals in renewable energy fell to the lowest since 2020, Bloomberg data shows.

When Nuveen Infrastructure began trying to exit some assets held by its 850 million euro European fund a couple of years ago, “people weren’t really engaging, not because our assets were bad, it’s just they were just keeping their powder dry a little”, said the investment manager’s Global Head of Clean Energy Joost Bergsma.

“Slowly we are starting to see a little bit more confidence, and also the exit market starts to be a bit more fluid in the clean energy space,” Bergsma said. Nuveen is in talks over potential deals for wind assets in Europe, he said.

The pace of exits slowed for the broader private equity market last year on uncertainty and market volatility stoked by US President Donald Trump’s trade policies. At the same time, the average premium in deals involving companies producing renewable energy fell to about 12 per cent in 2025, down from 46 per cent a year earlier, according to Bloomberg data.

The International Energy Agency forecasts renewable energy, particularly solar, to grow faster than any other major source of electricity generation to 2035. That’s being driven by an at least 40 per cent increase in global demand spurred by adoption of data centres, electric vehicles and air conditioners. The S&P Global Clean Energy Transition Index has advanced almost 6 per cent this year, extending gains following a 44 per cent surge in 2025.

As power demand, including for clean energy, “increases more than expected, we may find demand-supply tightening and a premium being paid for quality development assets”, said JPMorgan’s Zdun.

Operational projects with a credible offtake customer, rather than those still in development, remain more attractive to most investors because of the risks and complexity of bringing new solar or wind farms online, said Daniel Cheng, Brookfield’s head of renewable power and transition for Asia Pacific.

“There’s a very clear and mature market for investors to buy these operational assets that are long-term contracted,” Cheng said.

Brookfield, which last year raised US$20 billion for a global energy transition strategy, in November completed the acquisition of Alba Renewables, with projects in the Philippines and Thailand, and also added a wind project in Vietnam, the asset manager’s first renewables investments in the three countries. BLOOMBERG