Niqui Kohli is Head of Cleary Gottlieb’s Energy and Infrastructure Group.

Niqui advises private equity firms and other infrastructure investors, utilities, independent power producers, technology companies, and hyperscalers on mergers and acquisitions, strategic energy investments and partnerships, energy asset transactions, and the myriad transactions and policy issues fueled by data center and AI-driven load growth. His practice centers on the complex commercial, strategic, and policy matters at the heart of the energy sector today—matters that require a unique blend of industry, regulatory, and commercial sophistication. His experience spans the full range of energy infrastructure: solar, wind, storage, hydro, gas, LNG, nuclear, transmission, and data centers.

Niqui has advised on many of the most significant regulated utility and renewables transactions of recent years, including the sector’s wave of utility minority interest sales. He counsels on utility and power M&A, strategic capital-raising transactions, joint ventures, and transmission and generation asset sales and build-outs, frequently on a cross-border basis and for investors whose ownership structures raise the control, affiliation, and national security questions that follow foreign and fund ownership of regulated and critical infrastructure assets.

A core component of his practice involves structuring, negotiating, and executing power development and supply strategies for data centers at a scale the industry and regulators have not previously seen: multi-gigawatt retail service partnerships, dedicated supply for private campuses under retail tariff and behind-the-meter structures, bridging arrangements ahead of long-term retail service, development of new utility-scale generation, and co-location and powered land structures.

Clients bring Niqui in before the terms are fixed, while regulatory realities and creative structuring can still shape and optimize deal architecture and commercial terms. He draws on substantial Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, Department of Energy, and state Public Utility Commission experience—including Section 203 and multi-state approval strategies—and advises boards and investment committees on approval risk, control, and governance arrangements.

Niqui joined the firm as a partner in 2026.

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Notable Experience (including those prior to joining Cleary)

  • Advising leading technology companies on the structuring and negotiation of energy infrastructure and power supply arrangements, including contributions in aid of construction (CIACs), electric service agreements (ESAs), long-lead equipment agreements, and related instruments—transactions involving novel structures, complex retail rate, cost allocation and regulatory issues, and multiple gigawatts of new generation and significant transmission investments. Experience includes:

    • Serving as lead advisor on one of the largest data center power transactions in the world, structuring and negotiating power supply and infrastructure development agreements for delivery of nearly 5 GW of retail electric service, involving new combined-cycle generation facilities, a multi-state transmission buildout, battery storage, and nuclear plant upgrades.
    • Representing leading technology companies in behind-the-meter, co-location, and powered land transactions for data centers with independent generators across multiple states, often in conjunction with retail utility supply and grid interconnection.

  • American Electric Power Company Inc. on various strategic, regulatory, and transactional matters, including the $2.82 billion sale of a 19.9% interest in the company’s Ohio and Indiana & Michigan transmission companies to a partnership between investment funds managed by KKR and Public Sector Pension Investment Board, and the company’s board and governance arrangements with activist investor Carl C. Icahn and affiliates.

  • One of the world’s largest infrastructure investors in its $2.4 billion acquisition of a 19.9% stake in an electric services company.

  • Duke Energy Corporation in the $2.05 billion sale of a 19.9% stake in Duke Energy Indiana to GIC Private Limited, a Singaporean sovereign wealth fund.

  • PPL Corporation in its $3.8 billion acquisition from National Grid plc of The Narragansett Electric Company and, in a separate transaction, its £7.8 billion sale of its UK utility business, Western Power Distribution, to National Grid.

  • Infrastructure Investments Fund in its acquisition of South Jersey Industries Inc., with an enterprise value of $8.1 billion, and its $4.3 billion acquisition of El Paso Electric Company.

  • Emera Inc. in its $959 million sale of Emera Maine, its regulated electric transmission and distribution company in Maine, to ENMAX Corporation.

  • Pacific Gas and Electric Company on various strategic, regulatory, and transactional matters, including its $1 billion transmission right leasing program with Citizens Energy Corporation.

  • Hydro-Québec in connection with its bids into the Massachusetts Clean Energy Request for Proposal, including the Northern Pass Transmission Project, a 192-mile transmission line developed with Eversource Energy, and the New England Clean Energy Connect hydro project, developed with Central Maine Power Company, a subsidiary of Avangrid.

  • Bank of New York Mellon in a $400 million tax equity investment in four wind projects owned by EDPR, and in a tax equity investment associated with the repowering of three wind projects owned by Enel.

  • The 13 initial coordinating lead arrangers, lenders, and issuing banks in the approximately $5.8 billion debt financing of Venture Global LNG Inc.’s Calcasieu Pass LNG export project and associated TransCameron lateral gas pipeline, named a North America Deal of the Year by Project Finance International.

  • Financial services companies, a capital market company, and an investment banking company in nine separate project bond financings for an LNG export project for the issuance of nearly $15 billion of senior secured notes.

  • Various financial services companies and an investment banking company in four separate project bond financings of a liquefied natural gas company for the issuance of $5.75 billion of senior secured notes. The proceeds were used for the construction of two LNG trains and a pipeline.

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Selected Activities

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Energy Editorial Advisory Board Member, Law360, 2026

Publications

“Energy M&A trend: minority interest sales in regulated utility subsidiaries to raise equity capital,” Reuters, January 3, 2022