In Minnesota, BlackRock Is Acquiring Vital Infrastructure
A multibillion-dollar deal is set to hand private equity giant BlackRock one of the Midwest’s largest utilities, Minnesota Power. Opponents of the sale fear that this will only worsen the already skyrocketing cost of electricity.
In Minnesota, vital public infrastructure is set to be sold off to private equity. Critics of the move fear that already high electricity prices will climb further. (David Paul Morris / Bloomberg via Getty Images)
In a landmark case with national implications, Democratic Governor Tim Walz’s regulators have greenlit a private equity giant’s acquisition of one of the Midwest’s largest power companies.
Critics argue that the precedent-setting case opens the doors to a new wave of Wall Street behemoths buying up utilities across the country to cash in on skyrocketing electricity rates — and to drive those rates even higher.
For over a year, BlackRock has been battling to take over Minnesota Power, a utility company that keeps the lights on for more than one hundred thousand customers in northern Minnesota. As the Lever uncovered in an August investigation, the private equity behemoth muscled support from labor unions and so-called clean energy groups in Minnesota this summer to help push through the deal, despite widespread opposition.
On October 3, the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission, whose members were all appointed by Walz, voted unanimously to approve the $6.2 billion deal, in which BlackRock will acquire Minnesota Power’s parent company, Allete, taking it private.
Proponents of the acquisition have argued that BlackRock will provide the electric company the capital it needs to prepare for the climate transition, although this summer, a Minnesota judge overseeing the case disputed those claims, finding conclusively that such a deal could spike rates and harm Minnesota Power’s customers, and cast doubt on the conflicts of interest behind the deal’s backers.
Advocates say Minnesota Power’s acquisition by a global private equity firm is the first deal of its kind, but it likely won’t be the last. In recent months, BlackRock has been gearing up to acquire power infrastructure all around the country, all through its infrastructure investment arm, Global Infrastructure Partners. The firm is seeking to profit from the enormous energy demands of the AI boom, which have spurred data center construction nationwide and in turn led to higher electric bills for regular consumers.
Just before the Minnesota vote, news broke that BlackRock was also in talks to purchase Aligned Data Centers, a company that owns nearly eighty data centers around the world. Last week, the Financial Times reported that BlackRock’s Global Infrastructure Partners was nearing a deal to buy up AES, one of the nation’s biggest power plant companies.