Climate change

Financing India’s e-mobility transition

Macquarie is leading the development of a new blended finance platform, with the UN’s Green Climate Fund (GCF), to drive the adoption of electric vehicles (EVs) across India, helping reduce the country’s CO₂ emissions and improve urban air quality. The financing platform aims to deliver $US1.5 billion over the investment term to accelerate India’s transition towards higher levels of electric vehicles.

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Sector	Climate change
Sub-sector	Transport
Location	India

Opportunity

Transportation is India’s third-highest greenhouse gas-emitting sector, contributing 13 per cent of total CO₂ emissions, which have more than tripled since 1990.

Transport emissions are forecast to increase and are a major contributor to poor urban air quality. There is a significant opportunity to decarbonise the transport sector through electrification, but the transition faces barriers due to high vehicle acquisition costs, technology risks and the availability of charging infrastructure. The Government of India has identified transportation as a key priority as part of India’s COP26 pledge to achieve net zero carbon emission by 2070.

Approach

Macquarie has proposed to establish a platform which aims to introduce unique leasing and financing solutions to reduce the high upfront capital expenditure associated with EVs, tackle impediments around EV charging infrastructure and manage uncertainty around commercial EV performance.

Initially, the platform will focus on selected segments of the EV ecosystem such as e-buses, shared fleets and charging infrastructure, and will expand into other e-mobility sub-sectors as the market scales. In doing so, the platform also aims to contribute to an enabling environment for EV growth, leading to increased penetration of EVs and new market participants, including the growth of financing solutions and domestic manufacturing, and contributing to decreasing air pollution in urban environments.

With a 10-year implementation period, the platform is expected to deliver lifetime reduction of ~9.5 MtCO2e of greenhouse gas emissions.

The GCF has approved a commitment for $US200 million of junior equity to establish a first-of-its-kind EV focused leasing and financing company in India. The blended finance structure is designed to crowd-in private sector capital, leveraging GCF’s commitment to provide a risk-mitigating buffer to commercial investors. Macquarie aims to raise a further $US205 million from institutional investors to capitalise the platform, and over time, the Platform hopes to mobilise a total of ~$US1.5 billion of capital (including debt finance).

The GCF was established to support the efforts of developing countries to respond to the challenge of climate change. It seeks to promote a paradigm shift to low-emission and climate-resilient development through providing concessional finance to accelerate transformational projects and innovation.

This is the largest single country equity commitment from GCF and its first investment in any private sector institution in the transport sector.

Macquarie is leading the development of the platform. It is also a co-chair of CFLI India, with Tata Sons, an initiative to mobilise investment into India and begin a long-term effort with public, private, and multilateral initiatives to strengthen local enabling environments and facilitate private capital at scale. Macquarie Group Managing Director and CEO Shemara Wikramanayake is also leading a workstream on Mobilising Capital for Emerging Markets and Developing Economies as part of the Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero.

Macquarie has been investing in India since 2008, with an invested equity capital of $US2.5 billion.

Outcome