With a cumulative total of 1.8 billion in three phases, what did Towngas Energy's REITs do right?
Recently, Towngas Smart Energy (01083.HK) successfully issued 812 million yuan worth of "Zero-Carbon Smart Phase 3" REIT-like products on the Shenzhen Stock Exchange, with the coupon rate of the priority tranche maintaining at a low level of 2.3%. This is the third product launched by Towngas within less than a year after the release of the first photovoltaic-storage carbon-neutral REIT-like product in the entire market at the end of 2024. The cumulative financing scale is nearly 1.8 billion yuan, and more than 30% of the 5 billion yuan shelf issuance quota has been completed.
For a long time, distributed photovoltaic power generation in the industrial and commercial sectors has been regarded as non-standard assets difficult to securitize due to its large number of scattered points, complex property rights confirmation, and dispersed cash flows. Towngas Energy not only pioneered the path but also transformed it into a regular financing model. Currently, leading enterprises in the market such as Bicheng (formerly Baobi), Trina Home, and Yuexiu New Energy have successively deployed similar financial products. As a result, the securitization of distributed photovoltaic assets has become a hot topic in the industry this year.
Against the backdrop of the asset shortage, why can Towngas become a pioneer in the industry? What replicable experiences and in-depth thinking has its combination of "energy + AI + finance" brought to the development of the distributed energy industry?
01
Energy Scenarios : Dual Core Advantages to Build a Solid Foundation for High-Quality Assets
The continuous implementation of Towngas Energy's distributed photovoltaic REIT-like products lies in the high-quality operation of underlying assets and the stable and controllable cash flows - which are also the core lifelines of asset securitization.
Towngas Energy's parent company, The Hong Kong and China Gas Company, Limited, has a history of 163 years. It has been deeply involved in the mainland market for more than 30 years under the brand of "Towngas". Currently, it has deployed more than 320 city gas projects in 23 provinces, autonomous regions, and municipalities directly under the Central Government across the country, serving more than 42 million households and ranking among the top five city gas enterprises in China. Among them, 400,000 industrial and commercial enterprise customers constitute Towngas Energy's core resource pool. These customers have abundant rooftop resources and strong demand for green electricity, which highly matches the characteristics of distributed photovoltaic power generation, such as "local consumption and long-term stability". This enables Towngas to efficiently convert gas customers into photovoltaic customers, and the conversion cost is lower than the industry average.
Layout of 128 zero-carbon smart industrial parks of Towngas Energy
Meanwhile, Towngas has deployed 128 zero-carbon smart industrial parks to further reach more high-quality industrial customers, forming a dual-engine of "existing gas customers + new park customers". This unique resource endowment has created key conditions for resolving the three core pain points in the issuance of REIT-like products:
Firstly, cash flow stability. Most of Towngas' customers are industry leaders or large industrial enterprises with stable operations and good credit. The rigid demand for electricity ensures the consumption of photovoltaic power, and the self-consumption rate exceeds 80%, locking in long-term stable returns from the source.
Secondly, asset scale. Through unified development standards and digital management, Towngas integrates numerous small and scattered distributed single projects, meeting the scale threshold for REIT issuance.
Thirdly, risk diversification. The projects cover more than 20 provinces and more than 20 industries, with a highly diversified geographical and customer structure. Coupled with Towngas' existing gas infrastructure and local operation network, the operation and maintenance cost is significantly lower than the industry level, and the on-time payment rate of the projects is higher than the industry average, making the cash flow safe and controllable.
As of now, Towngas Energy has cumulatively connected 2.6GW of industrial distributed photovoltaic power generation to the grid, serving more than 2,000 industrial and commercial customers, which has laid a solid foundation for the continuous successful issuance of REIT-like products.
02
Technology Efficiency Improvement : Driving the Value Leap from "Asset Holding" to "Asset Management"
If high-quality assets are the entry ticket for REIT-like products, then the refined operation driven by AI is the core secret of Towngas' asset management ability - this ability has achieved a qualitative change from "passively guarding assets" to "actively managing assets", building a differentiated competitive advantage and directly breaking through the ceiling of asset returns.
National monitoring center for Towngas operation and maintenance
Relying on its self-developed algorithm model and the "Photovoltaic Star" management platform, Towngas has achieved AI optimization throughout the asset lifecycle: in the project development stage, through the integration of regional sunlight data, customer electricity load, and electricity price fluctuation trends for overall optimized design, the initial project return rate can be increased by 5%; in the operation and maintenance stage, 10% more electricity can be generated through AI intelligent operation and maintenance - in the low marginal cost model of REIT-like products, this 10% increment is almost equivalent to pure profit, significantly increasing the asset valuation.
Taking photovoltaic panel cleaning as an example, Towngas has abandoned the traditional fixed-frequency cleaning model and built an AI intelligent solution of "observe, calculate, and profit": by integrating inverter operation data, 14-day future weather data, infrared scanning thermal imaging data, and deep learning technology, it can accurately calculate the optimal cleaning time and area for each photovoltaic panel, avoiding both "early cleaning that wastes costs" and "late cleaning that results in electricity generation losses", achieving the optimal balance between operation and maintenance costs and electricity generation.
In the electricity trading link, Towngas relies on AI algorithms to accurately predict spot electricity price fluctuations and customer electricity loads, realizing intelligent matching and arbitrage in green electricity trading, and increasing the electricity sales revenue by 8% compared with the industry average, further amplifying the asset value.
More importantly, Towngas has created a visual system of the "asset health dashboard", breaking through the limitations of traditional financial statements and integrating the asset management scale (AuM) with a large amount of project data to dynamically monitor six core indicators such as the consumption rate, power generation completion rate, and payment collection rate. Once an indicator falls below the preset baseline, the system automatically triggers an alarm and links up with the local operation team for a quick response, transforming non-standard operation and maintenance into a standardized risk control process - this not only makes the asset status transparent in real-time but also ensures the long-term health of the underlying assets, adding an extra "safety lock" to the stable and continuous cash flow.
Overall, supported by its resource endowment and enhanced by AI technology, Towngas Energy not only guarantees stable asset returns but also has won wide recognition from investment institutions such as banks, insurance companies, and local governments.
03
Financial Empowerment : Guided by REIT-like Products, Building a Light Asset Management Platform
The regular issuance of the three phases of REIT-like products is a natural result of the in-depth integration of "energy + technology" by Towngas, and it is also the key financial support for the closed-loop of "raising - investing - managing - exiting", making the light-asset asset management model scalable and replicable.
Breaking down this closed-loop model, we can see its core logic:
Raising: Relying on its own billions of yuan in start-up funds and in cooperation with central enterprise capital and industrial ecosystem partners, it builds a low-cost and highly stable capital guarantee system;
Investing: Adopting a parallel approach of "new construction of high-quality projects + acquisition of potential assets" - new projects focus on zero-carbon smart parks and rooftop resources of leading enterprises, and through the rapid identification and value enhancement of acquired projects, it achieves an annual asset expansion of GW level;
Managing: With AI algorithms at the core, combined with the integrated "gas - electricity - carbon" service and the EaaS full lifecycle model, it provides customers with a one-stop solution of "design - construction - operation and maintenance - trading - carbon reduction" for their projects, which not only enhances customer stickiness but also continuously amplifies the long-term asset value;
Exiting: Through financial innovation such as REIT-like products, it realizes the securitization and off-balance-sheet treatment of mature assets (while retaining operation and maintenance management), quickly recovers funds for reinvestment in the next cycle, and drives the continuous expansion of the management scale.
The core value of this closed-loop model lies in making Towngas more like a "light-asset clean energy asset management platform": the asset-liability ratio is continuously optimized, the capital utilization efficiency is greatly improved, and the anti-cycle ability is significantly enhanced. This meets the preference of the capital market for "high-growth, low-risk" targets.
Looking globally, Towngas is not alone. Its development path is similar to the strategic logic of global utility giant ACWA Power. The latter has achieved in-depth control and maximized value of the entire value chain through its full lifecycle model covering "development - investment - operation - optimization", winning high recognition from the international capital market.
04
Conclusion: Leading the Industry with an Asset Management Closed-Loop, Opening Up Long-Term Growth Space
Against the backdrop of the in-depth advancement of the "dual carbon" process and the upcoming implementation of the 15th Five-Year Plan, the policy dividends in areas such as zero-carbon parks, distributed energy, and source-network-load-storage integration will continue to be released, and the securitization of distributed photovoltaic power has entered an acceleration period. Towngas Energy has taken REIT-like products as a breakthrough point to build a complete asset management closed-loop of "resource acquisition - management efficiency improvement - capital exit", which not only verifies the feasibility of the industry-finance integration model but also establishes its leading advantage in the industry.
For the capital market, the innovative value of Towngas lies in: through standardized and professional asset management capabilities, it transforms the originally non-standard and scattered clean energy assets into securitizable and scalable high-quality targets, solving the pain points of "heavy assets and difficult exit" in the industry; its positioning as a "light-asset asset management platform" means that its core value no longer depends on the installed capacity but on its unique resource endowment, AI-driven asset management capabilities, and sustainable capital closed-loop. This model has higher anti-cycle ability and growth elasticity.
For the industry, Towngas, based on heavy asset holding, has deeply cultivated the light-asset asset management business and built a core competitiveness of coordinated heavy and light assets, providing a replicable solution for distributed photovoltaic operators to deal with industry cycle fluctuations and improve capital efficiency. In 2025, Towngas successfully established a 600 million yuan special fund for industrial and commercial energy storage in cooperation with the Shenzhen Energy Storage Fund and Sunwoda, which verifies the recognition of the Towngas model. In the future, with the continuous expansion of the asset management scale, the in-depth implementation of AI technology, and the regular issuance of REIT-like products, the integrated advantages of Towngas Energy's "energy scenarios + technology efficiency improvement + financial empowerment" will continue to be amplified, further consolidating the asset management value, injecting strong impetus into long-term high-quality development and strategic layout next year, and is expected to become a benchmark in the clean energy asset management field.