Ground has been broken near London’s M25 motorway, ready to house one of Britain’s biggest grid-scale batteries.
Tesla Megapack’s lithium ion technology is the core of co-developers Harmony Energy’s and Fotowatio’s (FRV) chunky 99MW/ 198MWh amp hotel. Work has begun on a site at Clay Tye, in Upminster’s verdant hinterlands.
The pair have co-operated before to deliver a similar Tesla-based grid goliath, at Holes Bay near Poole. A third collaboration also already sparked up is the duo’s 34 MW/ 68 MWh Contego storage unit near Burgess Hill.
Cables into UK Power Network’s regional grid from both the Dorset and West Sussex sites permit monetising the boxes already operating via flex trading and stabilisation services.
Harmony now has a portfolio of 1.2GWh in battery projects shovel ready stage around Britain. Peter Kavanagh’s firm recently sold development rights for 50MW of storage to SSE.
Financing the Upminster project is expected to close within weeks, and be fully constructed over the next 18 months.
Saudi Arabian family-based conglomerate Abdul Latif Jameel owns FRV-X, the technology platform of FRV. It boasts a pipeline of around 1GWh of storage projects at various stages of development worldwide, including 83MWh already commissioned.
“The start-up of the Contego plant and the progress in construction at Clay Tye hold enormous significance for FRV” said David Menéndez, head of FRV-X. “They brings us closer to our goal of expanding our portfolio of energy storage projects internationally”.
Britain’s current biggest grid-goliath battery in operation is Penso and Limejump‘s 100 MW project near Minety, Wiltshire, being readied for expansion to 150 MW.
