Solar row turns heat on green energy trust

The future of a green energy trust backed by the government is in the balance amid a dispute with its investment manager over a solar project in India.

ThomasLloyd Group, an investor in green energy projects in Asia, yesterday pleaded for a row with the board of the listed ThomasLloyd Energy Impact Trust to stop being played out in public.

The Foreign Office owns an 18 per cent stake in the trust after putting £24.5 million of taxpayer funds into it. The trust invests in green energy infrastructure in developing economies including India, the Philippines and Bangladesh.

The trust’s board and ThomasLloyd Group have been engaged in tit-for-tat exchanges about whether the investment manager withheld information about the status of the Rewa Ultra Mega Solar project in Madhya Pradesh.

On Tuesday the trust board claimed that information provided by a whistleblower suggested it had been misled by ThomasLloyd Group about “substantial increases in the costs and capital requirements associated with” the project.

The board claimed that the investment manager knew about the alleged problems in August last year and “at that point it would have been apparent that the project would not be commercially viable” yet at a December board meeting, “the board was told that no additional equity was required”.

The trust alleged that the “delay in full disclosure” resulted in “material financial uncertainty”, leading to a delay in last year’s accounts and to the suspension of its shares in April.

On Wednesday the investment manager hit out at what it called “false allegations” that it had not shared “key information that ought to have been disclosed to the board” or that misleading information was provided to the trust. It said it was “deeply inappropriate” for the board to have published allegations which it said it was still investigating. It said it had “no knowledge” of the allegations until it saw the trust’s statement.

That prompted another salvo from the trust board, which yesterday insisted its claims were supported by “verified documentary evidence” and that it had a regulatory duty to disclose them.

ThomasLloyd Group asked the board to “desist from continuing this public debate”. A government spokeswoman said it was for the board to update investors about the issue.