ArcLight Nears $1.5 Billion On Fund V

The Boston energy specialist ArcLight Capital Partners LLC has reached the three-quarter mark on its latest fund, according to a regulatory filing.

Arclight Energy Partners Fund V LP has raised $1.47 billion toward its $2 billion target, the Aug 4 filing showed. The firm held a $382.7 million first close in January.

Formed in 2001 by co-founders Daniel R. Revers and Robb E. Turner, ArcLight invests broadly in the energy industry, including coal, oil and gas production, midstream, power generation, gas and electric transmission and distribution and related services businesses. Arclight says it manages more than $6.8 billion in its four previous funds.

The firm has drawn nearly 70 percent of investors’ commitments to predecessor ArcLight Energy Partners Fund IV LP, a $2.1 billion pool that closed in 2007, according to the California Public Employees’ Retirement System, which committed $250 million to Fund IV. The 2006-vintage ArcLight Energy Partners Fund III LP has delivered a 1.20x multiple and a 6.7 percent IRR, as of Dec. 31, 2010, while the 2004-vintage Arclight Energy Partners Fund II sports a 1.70x multiple and an 18.6 percent IRR, CalPERS reported.

The firm targets companies based in North America, Western Europe, Australia, and New Zealand. It typically invests between $50 million and $150 million in companies valued between $200 million and more than $1 billion.

In June, Arclight won financing commitments for the second phase of its Terra-Gen Power project in Tehachapi, Calif., a planned 1,550 megawatt wind energy facility that the firm is developing in conjunction with Global Infrastructure Partners, an independent infrastructure fund based in New York and London. Terra-Gen Power would be twice the size of the United States’s largest existing wind-power plant, according to an announcement at the time.

In October, ArcLight formed a joint venture with OGE Energy Corp. of Oklahoma City, called Enogex Holdings, after ArcLight paid OGE $183 million for a 9.9 percent stake in its Enogex unit, a midstream natural gas pipeline business. OG&E is a regulated electric utility serving Oklahoma and western Arkansas.

Barclays Capital Inc., Madison Williams and Co. LLC and Merrill Lynch are helping Arclight market its current fund, according to the regulatory filing.