Leveraging the Potential of Crowdfunding for Financing Renewable Energy

Abstract

• Renewable energy (RE) projects in Indonesia usually have IRR between 10% and 15% and PP around 6 to 30 years • Attractive return usually could be found in large scale RE projects, although there are numerous other factors involved including technology developments, capacity scale, power purchasing price agreements, project locations, as well as interest rates and applied incentives. • Crowdfunding (CF) has big potential to contribute to the financing of RE projects especially financing small scale RE projects. • P2P lending usually targeted short-term loans with high interest rates. Therefore, it cannot be employed as an alternative financing for RE projects in Indonesia. • Three types of CF that can be employed as an alternative for RE project funding in Indonesia. Namely, securities, reward, and donation-based CF. In addition, hybrid models such as securities-reward and reward-donation could also be explored according to the project profitability. • Several benefits offer by securities crowdfunding (SCF) compared to conventional banking and P2P lending, as follows: (1) issuer do not need to pledge assets as collateral; (2) do not require to pay instalment each month; (3) issuer share risks with investors with no obligation to cover the investor’s loss; (4) applicable for micro, small, medium, enterprises (MSMEs) with no complex requirements; and (5) there is possibility to attract investors with bring specific value. • Several challenges that need to be tackled such as the uncertainty of RE regulations; (1) issuer’s inability in managing the system and business; (2) the absence of third parties in bridging between CF platform and potential issuer from RE project owner; (3) the lack of financial literacy of the potential funders; and (4) lastly the inadequacy of study regarding potential funders in escalating the RE utilisation in Indonesia.