Our Practice
Snell & Wilmer’s Infrastructure Development and Project Finance Group provides comprehensive, integrated legal services for all facets of large-scale infrastructure projects, ranging from planning and inception, through capitalization, financing, development and construction, and finally to operations and disposition. Our team, which brings creative and innovative approaches to projects, has deep and broad experience in a wide variety of disciplines.
Our Experience
The depth of our experience extends to:
- Bonds, securities and public finance
- Capital formation and structured finance
- Construction transactions
- Energy and energy transmission
- EPC, EPCM and a variety of design-build delivery methods
- Governmental relations
- Land use and zoning
- Maintenance and operating agreements
- Permitting
- Regulatory and environmental permitting, compliance and authorization
- Site acquisition and entitlements
- Structure and organization of corporate entities, joint ventures and partnerships
- Supply and off-take agreements
- Tax-exempt, tax increment and tax credit financing
Our practice recognizes the need for innovative structures to fund and develop capital-intensive projects, such as public-private partnerships, and we understand well the need for maximizing the value of public capital assets through partnering with private entities, and vice versa.
The breadth of our experience extends and applies these skills to energy, utility, natural resources, Brownfields redevelopment, water treatment, manufacturing, processing, educational, single and mixed-use commercial real estate, transportation projects and facilities, affordable housing, community development and health care and hospital projects. We represent a variety of clients in these areas, including lenders and financial institutions, utilities, investors, sponsors, public and private owners (including Native American tribes), governmental entities, engineering firms and EPC contractors.
Our Clients
Snell & Wilmer’s Infrastructure Development and Project Finance Group has been involved in many recent prominent infrastructure projects in the western United States and throughout the world, including:
Energy
- Siting, procurement and construction of a 2,100 MW generating facility.
- Development of a twenty mile double-circuit 500 kV interconnection line for a new 2400 MW power plant, including environmental assessment services.
- Agreement for plant site, water rights, air quality credits and permitting associated with construction of 550 MW power plant.
- Development of multiple wind projects, including real estate, construction and environmental services.
- Development of a thirty mile double-circuit 230 kV project with several substations.
- Siting and construction of a 550 MW power plant and negotiation of off-take agreement for plant output.
- Negotiation of a renewable energy purchase and sale agreement for all energy produced by a 280 MW solar trough power plant.
- Negotiation of acquisition, financing and development of an Asia off-shore natural gas field; of related downstream facilities for processing the natural gas for petrochemical and automobile fuel applications; and of the midstream pipeline infrastructure.
Natural Resources
- Development, financing and construction of a Latin American gold mine.
- Construction of several domestic and international gold, silver and precious metals mines.
- Development of a large oil and gas gathering system, including pipeline, rail and EPC contracts, for an oil and gas field.
- Power purchase agreement for a utility-scale 280MW solar thermal generation facility.
- Negotiation of solar services agreement and site license agreement for a distributed generation photovoltaic solar facility.
- Venture capital financing for wind turbine technology.
- Venture capital financing for oil, shale and coal conversion process.
- Financing of a geothermal generation facility.
Facilities
- Acquisition and development of 12,000 acres for the development of a large automotive testing facility in North America.
- Development and construction of large hospital facility, including acquisition and entitlement work.
- Acquisition, leasing and development of college campus sites throughout the United States and worldwide.
- Management and development agreements with a tribal entity involving the purchase and transfer of land for development of a casino/hotel project.
- Development of affordable rental housing projects financed with private equity, private loans, governmental loans and federal income tax credits.
- Redevelopment of major contaminated site into a mixed-use, TOD project involving major transportation, utility and related infrastructure elements.
- Regulatory approval for environmentally impaired properties for ongoing and final investigation, remediation and clean up.
- Development of disparate broadband telecom networks with local partners in multiple countries in Europe, Africa and Asia utilizing private and public agency financing facilities.
Major Mixed-Use Projects
- Redevelopment of 4,000-acre former air force base into integrated mixed-use new community.
- Planning and designing of master community and neighborhood village governing regimes and documentation for a new 500 acre master planned, mixed-use community.
- Urban renewal of several developments involving office, retail and residential uses within a mixed-use condominium regime, utilizing several layers and forms of public and private financing and credit enhancement vehicles.
Transportation
- Development of Transit Oriented Development project, involving a mixed-use office/ retail/parking development.
- Special district bond financing for infrastructure including highways, roads, utility and related infrastructure for large new developments.
Corporate Campuses
- Acquisition and entitlements for a large 432-acre corporate campus, preliminarily approved for 2.5 million square feet of facilities.
