Electric Utility Finance

Kutak Rock has worked on a wide range of financing transactions for public and investor-owned electric utilities. As bond counsel, we have the rare distinction of having done the legal work to create a public utility, and have participated in a broad spectrum of tax-exempt financings including generation and transmission facilities, environmental and performance upgrades, distribution networks and working capital related to such projects.

Our work on behalf of electric utility issuers has included senior bond revenue transactions, commercial paper, “minibonds,” subordinate bonds and separate system bonds (debt supported by payments from other utilities under participation agreements). We frequently provide tax opinions on new-money issues and refunding transactions, and have extensive experience analyzing issues related to Section 142 exempt facility financings. Kutak Rock attorneys have been among the first to assist clients in availing themselves of novel financing opportunities. As bond counsel, our extraordinary tax depth and experience enables us to provide confident, creative answers to client issues by drawing on our years of practical experience across the full range of public finance specialties and our extensive network of contacts within the private tax counsel community and the government.

As counsel to underwriters and credit enhancers, Kutak Rock has worked on an equally broad range of electric utility financings. Our geographic scope and depth of subject matter knowledge allow us to proactively identify issues and structure solutions quickly and efficiently. Whether an issue relates to real estate matters, federal or state securities laws, bankruptcy or Uniform Commercial Code questions, federal or state tax credits, interest rate hedges or variable rate bond structures, we have attorneys familiar with the subject matter and are able to suggest alternatives and provide practical, experience-based advice.

Water and Sewer Finance

Because of the critical role of municipal water and sewer systems in providing modern sanitation, bonds issued to finance the operations of such systems are perhaps the most common type of municipal financing.  As a national public finance counsel firm, Kutak Rock has vast experience with such financings. 

We have been involved in water and sewer financings for states and major metropolitan areas as well as townships and villages.  In this area of public finance, our experience runs the gamut from serving as counsel to small municipalities maintaining their vital water and sewer systems with capital improvements to acting as counsel for the financing of a large and complex water project that diverts river water to treatment facilities for domestic use by residents in a region experiencing chronic drought and participating in the successful refinancing of the water and sewer system of a large municipality in bankruptcy. 

Natural Gas Prepay Transactions

Kutak Rock has been deeply involved in the development and implementation of prepaid energy financings since their initial development in the early 1990s.  Our attorneys pioneered the development of many of the existing financing structures in this area.  We have acted as bond counsel, special tax counsel, supplier counsel, municipal participant counsel and underwriter’s counsel relative to gas prepayment municipal bond issues.  We have also guided issuers through the intricacies of early termination of highly structured energy prepayment transactions.  Kutak Rock’s creativity, enthusiasm and experience in the energy prepayment space enable us to provide efficient, effective representation to clients at every stage of the development, closing and implementation of these complex financings.