Approximately US$1 billion of bonds due to be issued by The Greater Orlando Aviation Authority (GOAA) to fund the expansion of Orlando International Airport have been assigned a score of E1/78 by S&P’s Global Ratings’ Green Evaluation.
The environmental impact of a project is analysed under the Green Evaluation framework, and then receives a score on a scale of 0-100 and E1-E4, where E1 denotes the strongest contribution to meeting climate change targets, and E4 a lesser contribution.
The bonds will finance part of the costs of South Terminal Complex (STC) project, namely the construction of five new buildings and several enabling projects as part of the estimated US$2.15 billion expansion.
The evaluation is attached, but here are the key takeaways:
• The South Terminal has been designed and is expected to meet the U.S. Green Building Certification’s LEED Version 4 standards post-construction. GOAA is targeting 20% energy savings compared to a baseline, higher than the 16% required to meet LEED certification.
• The Governance score (85) and Mitigation score (84) reflect S&P Global’s favourable view of GOAA’s management of proceeds and impact assessment practices associated with the financing, in addition to the GOAA’s intention to measure energy and water usage savings for the economic life of the projects.
• While the bonds will not be labelled green, all proceeds from the bond’s issuance will be applied to projects within the scope of the STC project and therefore eligible for a Green Evaluation.