Overview

Just as our traditional energy clients experience a range of concerns when launching, growing and operating their businesses, so do Winstead’s alternative energy clients.

Whether managing risks involved in bilateral energy sales, obtaining necessary permitting for power generators, conducting environmental due diligence during property acquisitions, or advising on securities-based transactions in biofuel projects, Winstead’s full-service capabilities are a flexible and comprehensive resource for clients.

As active counselors within the renewable and alternative energy field, we understand the unique market pressures our clients face and now the value of practical, cost-efficient solutions to their challenges. As with other public law areas, our environmental team includes experienced counsel who have served inside the regulatory agency. Among our lawyers is the former general counsel for the TCEQ and Texas House Committee on Environmental Regulation.

Representative areas of our counsel include:

• Transactions – Advise, guide, and counsel on state and federal regulatory requirements, permits, and approvals associated with transactions involving electric industry market participants, including corporate restructurings, security offerings and board appointments. We also represent purchasers and sellers in the sale and exchange of generating units.
  
  
• Tax Incentive and Credits –Ongoing client counsel and monitoring of existing and emerging tax-advantaged opportunities in the alternative and renewable energy sectors. 
  
  
• Land Use and Real Estate – Represent clients in site acquisition, licensing and permitting for generation, both renewable and fossil fuel, and transmission right of way and facilities, including transmission route planning and acquisition. 
  
  
• Wind Lease – Represented a landowner in a wind lease negotiation with a Portuguese-owned, Houston-based wind developer. 
  
  
• Wind Farm Title – Addressed warranty of title issues that arose in the negotiation of the wind lease development agreement involving an onshore 10,000-acre wind farm. 
  
  
• Environmental Permitting Dispute – Obtained air permitting for a cement plant to burn an alternative, waste-derived fuel in place of coal to create heat to make cement. Secured TCEQ and EPA permits over a two-year period in a contested case. 
  
  
• Contracts and Agreements – Draft and negotiate power purchase and sales agreements, fuel supply contracts, interconnection agreements and related consent and financing agreements associated with the development of generation facilities. 
  
  
• Corporate/Green Batteries – Advise on corporate matters to developer and producer of green batteries for cars and wireless communications. 
  
  
• Construction – Counsel on the construction of generation facilities and disputes with respect to claims of breach of construction contracts. 
  
  
• Litigation and Disputes – Provide litigation counsel on claims of breach of power purchase agreements for renewable energy generation facilities, as well as disputes involving supply and quality issues.

Project Finance
Public and Regulatory Law
Electricity Regulatory and Industry Counsel
Government Relations
Intellectual Property Protection
Real Estate, Environment, Tax and Commercial Transations, and Litigation

Back to Alternative Energy