Canadian Microgrid Expansion: Spring Lane Capital and Partners Launch CAD$100 Million Investment
Longtime microgrid and clean energy project investor Spring Lane Capital is uniting with two Canadian partners to deploy about CAD$100 million for distributed energy resource deployment in that nation.
The joint venture teams private equity firm Spring Lane Capital with energy developers AltCrest Energy and Development Engine Partners (or DevEngine). The collaboration will focus around developing and owning DER systems including microgrids, battery storage and solar PV, among other decarbonization strategies.
The projects developed by the joint venture will be under the energy-as-a-service (EaaS) model, which takes on 100% of the upfront development and construction costs. The customer pays for energy usage on long-term contracted agreements which create financial predictability.
“The Canadian energy infrastructure market benefits from strong fundamentals,” adds Jason Scott, Partner, Spring Lane Capital, in a statement. “Distributed energy resources provide substantial benefits that help meet grid energy requirements and contribute to advancing the new energy transition. Furthermore, the Canadian government continues to support the growth of renewable energy systems from a policy perspective, making Canada an attractive market to operate and deploy capital.”
Toronto-based AltCrest will focus on helping commercial real estate customers with distributed energy solutions. Its previous projects including solar, geothermal, microgrid and battery solutions have been completed under the EaaS model.
“As electricity demand continues to grow, driven by the increase in AI data centers, onshoring of manufacturing, and adoption of electric vehicles, there is a significant increase in demand for power, causing scarcity of energy and increasing electricity prices,” said Ben Gilbank, Founder & CEO of AltCrest. “DERs play an increasingly significant role in providing owners, tenants, and users with power availability, cost certainty, and in many cases, significant savings, to ensure successful operations.”
Spring Lane Capital’s director of portfolio operations is Ken Horne, who has been a longtime editorial advisor with the Microgrid Knowledge Conference. Microgrid Knowledge 2026 will be May 4-6 at the Renaissance SeaWorld in Orlando.
About the Author
Rod Walton, Microgrid Knowledge Managing Editor
Managing Editor
For Microgrid Knowledge editorial inquiries, please contact Managing Editor Rod Walton at [email protected].
I’ve spent the last 15 years covering the energy industry as a newspaper and trade journalist. I was an energy writer and business editor at the Tulsa World before moving to business-to-business media at PennWell Publishing, which later became Clarion Events, where I covered the electric power industry. I joined Endeavor Business Media in November 2021 to help launch EnergyTech, one of the company’s newest media brands. I joined Microgrid Knowledge in July 2023.
I earned my Bachelors degree in journalism from the University of Oklahoma. My career stops include the Moore American, Bartlesville Examiner-Enterprise, Wagoner Tribune and Tulsa World, all in Oklahoma . I have been married to Laura for the past 33-plus years and we have four children and one adorable granddaughter. We want the energy transition to make their lives better in the future.
Microgrid Knowledge and EnergyTech are focused on the mission critical and large-scale energy users and their sustainability and resiliency goals. These include the commercial and industrial sectors, as well as the military, universities, data centers and microgrids. The C&I sectors together account for close to 30 percent of greenhouse gas emissions in the U.S.
Many large-scale energy users such as Fortune 500 companies, and mission-critical users such as military bases, universities, healthcare facilities, public safety and data centers, shifting their energy priorities to reach net-zero carbon goals within the coming decades. These include plans for renewable energy power purchase agreements, but also on-site resiliency projects such as microgrids, combined heat and power, rooftop solar, energy storage, digitalization and building efficiency upgrades.