The new tariff, Empower Exclusive, is designed to spur yet more uptake of Britain’s estimated 1.2 million homes fitted with solar PV arrays.

Exclusively available to new customers who install a panels-plus battery bundle through EDF’s in-house installer, Contact Solar, the Empower Exclusive tariff is promoted as saving a standard home more than £800 per year against EdF’s standard variable tariff.

EdF is also offering £500 off a new panels-plus-battery installation to the promotion’s first 500 customers, and without any deposit before installation.

EdF bought Chorley-based Contact Solar earlier this year and has integrated it into its operations.  The supplier says more price & package deals related to home solar are in the offing.

This first deal helps customers charge their batteries overnight, providing three hours of discounted, zero carbon electricity for three hours starting at 1:00am.  By charging the battery more cheaply overnight, the discount helps householders reduce their reliance on external supply during peak hours.

With systems available for on average £8,500 for a typical 3-bedroom house, Contact Solar’s package offer includes 10 panels, a 5kW hybrid inverter and 5.32kWh battery, all installation and scaffolding costs, a 10-year battery and inverter warranty, a 25-year panel warranty, virtual and technical survey costs, and access to a system monitoring and performance app.

All combinations of solar and battery installs will also benefit from 0% VAT.

Tom Taylor, director at Contact Solar, said: “We’re delighted to now be a fully integrated part of EdF, bringing exceptional new benefits to customers such as this new exclusive energy bundle.

Philippe Commaret, EdF’s managing director of customers, added: “We know more and more people are looking for ways to save cash and carbon, which is why we’re pleased to bring this unique solar product bundle to the market.

To check eligibility for the tariff, click here: Tariff Eligibility Criteria | EDF (EdFenergy.com)

For more information or to sign up to the Empower Exclusive tariff, click here: https://www.EdFenergy.com/solar#empower

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Today’s latest estimate of the price of Britain’s slow investment in tested utility-scale BESS (battery and energy storage systems) comes from battery developers Field.

A notorious pinch point in Anglo-Scots transmission, known as the ‘B6’ boundary, intermittently blocks cross-Border electricity flows, themselves a legacy of too-slow investment in long-distance transmission, the battery developer asserts. The result is British homes and organisations left avoidably on the hook for hundreds of millions, while years are spent in network upgrades.

Grid capacity constraints plus substituting gas-fired power for wasted renewables, added nearly £1 billion of ‘curtailment’ costs to electricity bills for homes and businesses in 2023, the company calculates. Abundant energy from wind farms was unable to be transmitted to areas of demand.

The majority of last year’s £920 million total cost was caused by bottlenecks at the B6 boundary. Analysis published  by Field estimates this boundary alone could cause up to £2.2 billion of curtailment costs by 2030, if left unaddressed. Overall UK curtailment costs could reach £3.5 billion by that date.

The firm’s analysis also asserts that wind farms in Scotland are being curtailed as much as 40% of the time. Transmission capacity across key boundaries in the UK, including at B6, rarely has more than a 50% utilisation rate, further restricting backbone power flows.

Increasing the amount of “intertrip services” which the NG- ESO can buy and using “Grid Booster” batteries could both help solve problem. The latter technology, says Field, is already being deployed in continental Europe and Australia.

Around 90% of the curtailment fees linked to the B6 boundary could be solved by adding 10GW of energy storage nearby, Field suggests.

It calls on co-operation between the now independent NG-ESO , Ofgem and D-ESNZ to:

• Prioritise cost effective measures like batteries and related services to maximise use of the existing grid.
• Opt for physical batteries before focusing on market-based mechanisms such as zonal pricing. The latter will unnerve investors certainty, and take a long time to implement.

 Field’s CEO Amit Gudka commented:

“In an era where energy bills remain high and carbon emissions keep rising, it’s alarming that we’re wasting clean, cheap, abundant energy on a daily basis. As our analysis suggests, this problem is getting worse, not better.

“More efficient use of established technologies, such as battery storage, would dramatically reduce curtailment costs and network investment needs. It would also reduce the need for expensive, complex and disruptive market-based mechanisms such as zonal pricing”

Operators of backbone transmission have begun addressing the problem. The Eastern Green Links (EGL) 1 and 2 connectors, both rated at 2GW and with the latter backed by National Grid’s and SSE’s transmission units, last year received initial planning consent.

Due for commissioning in 2029, EGL2 will run for 290 miles under the ocean from Peterhead to east Yorkshire, near Drax.

Three more 525kV connectors are on transcos’ drawing boards. And last month the NG-ESO announced £58 billion worth of improvements, intended to add 86GW of new transmission capacity alone by 2035.

Commissioning such wider pipes cannot come too soon, says Field.

Founded three years ago, its first BESS unit, a 20MWh device in Oldham, began homing ohms in 2022.  Within a pipeline of 4.5 GWh of further projects, Field claims 410 MWh of sites are either shovel-ready or already in construction.

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The science and technology committee’s enquiry into mass adoption of high volume, long duration electricity storage beyond the two hour mark, accuses ministers of dithering, and sending confusing signals to investors, system operators, developers and distributors.

Storage as an enabler of carbon-free power needs urgent support in order to scale up in time to meet Net Zero, says the committee.  But currently its backers confronts a policy void in Whitehall.

Storage technologies for power reserves lasting potentially months include chemical-, terrain, marine- and gravity-based methods. In general terms the committee favours hydrogen as the most widely applicable, due to its low cost of production and ubiquity.

Under the blunt title ‘Get on with it’, their Lordships’ report lists key recommendations, including

• Speeding up decisions needed for D-ESNZ’s anticipated energy system plan. These include choices needed on hydrogen, seen as a front-runner technology by the committee, as a mainstay of supra-two hour storage mechanisms.

“The UK cannot wait for decisions in 2025 and 2026 to invest in storage if the commitment to a secure decarbonised electricity system by 2035 is to be realised”, the committee warns.

• Commit to a strategic power reserve. Ministers should accept the National Infrastructure Commission’s goal of 25 TWh of electricity a year by 2040, says the committee.

“We are concerned that the Government seems to have only just begun thinking about whether it needs a strategic reserve and has no clear plan for supply shocks”, the report admonishes.

• State a minimum national target for energy storage. The government should assess and acknowledge the likely minimum scale of storage across different durations needed to balance the energy system”, the committee urges. “This will set the scale of ambition that policies to support storage must meet.

Interest from private investors has been strong in recent years; McKinsey is among consultants maintaining a working group composed of multinational corporations. In 2021 it recommended that global long-term storage capacity should reach between 1.5 and 2.5 GWh by 2040.

Commenting on the report – available here –  consultant Jack Green-Morgan from Dods Political Intelligence said,

“The Lord committee adds fuel to the argument that the UK needs to rapidly invest in new technologies to improve domestic energy security and reduce emissions from the power sector”.

“Investing in long-term energy storage has the potential to make more efficient use of cheap renewable energy by storing energy when output is higher than demand, and releasing it when demand exceeds output.

“Published just one day after the Energy Secretary announced the government would support the construction of new unabated gas power plants”, Green-Morgan added, “the committee will feel vindicated in their assessment that the failure to invest in flexible energy storage has increased the UK’s reliance on fossil fuels and vulnerability to external shocks”.

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The transaction covers Wärtsilä’s second contracted delivery of an energy storage system to Zenobē, and is one of Scotland’s largest to date.

It will be the first facility built with Wärtsilä’s Quantum High Energy, a next-generation energy storage system. Quantum^HE provides increased energy density for Zenobē and is fitted with state-of-the-art features to ensure the highest level of safety for the surrounding community. It is is expected to be operational by the end of 2025.

The project will be delivered under the National Grid’s NOA Stability Pathfinder programme, which aims to cost-effectively address stability issues in the electricity system created by the increased adoption of intermittent renewable generation.

The latest device will help grid operators to better balance supply and demand and ensure that the country’s abundant wind generation is not wasted. The project is expected to abate 3,400,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions over the next 15 years.

“Wärtsilä is proud to partner with Zenobē to accelerate the transition to renewable energy in Scotland,” said Andy Tang, vice president, Wärtsilä energy storage.

“This project brings Wärtsilä’s portfolio of energy storage assets in the United Kingdom over 2 gigawatt hours. We are committed to assisting customers in the UK reach their national decarbonisation targets through innovative energy storage solutions.”

The latest venture  project follows the announcement in February 2023 of a 200 MW / 400 MWh energy storage system Wärtsilä will deliver to Zenobē in Blackhillock, Scotland. Now under construction, pictured, Blackhillock is on track to work by autumn 2024.

“Reaching this significant milestone demonstrates Zenobē’s commitment to better utilise wind power and support its growth by doubling Scotland’s battery storage capacity. Kilmarnock South will enhance the country’s position as a leader in delivering energy that is cost-effective, clean and efficient,” commented Zenobē’s founder James Basden.

The Kilmarnock South project is Wärtsilä’s second project being delivered to meet NOA Stability Pathfinder requirements. Wärtsilä’s intelligent energy management system, the GEMS Digital Energy Platform, will ease network constraints by importing electricity at times of peak renewable generation. GEMS’ data-based intelligence will enable Zenobē to participate in the most valuable UK electricity markets.

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The company already has operations in Britain and Australia. Now it is allying with Milan-based battery developer ACL Energy and BW ESS, a global storage firm.

ACL will lead its international partners towards satisfying the peninsular’s burgeoning demand for grid-scale batteries, expected to be one of Europe’s most active.  Italy’s transmission system operator Terna estimates that Italy will need around 27GW of energy storage capacity by 2033, accommodating a planned 120 GW+ of renewable generation connected to the Italian grid.

Each of the trio will become joint shareholders in three projects at development stage totalling 395MW connection capacity, and jointly fund them.

Penso Power CEO Richard Thwaites, pictured, said: “Italy is a priority market for us and the combination of skillsets that this joint venture brings together positions us to take a leading role in Italian energy storage.

“We have been working closely with BW ESS for several years and have benefitted from having them as a shareholder and project partner.  We regard the ACL team very highly and are delighted to formalise our partnership with them.”

The 111MW project in Lombardy and the 97MW project in Puglia have been submitted to the Italian Ministry of Energy for approval.  The 187MW project in Piemonte will be submitted for approval later this year.

ACL Energy managing partner Nicola Locascio said: “We are proud to enter this partnership with international players with such successful track record in the energy storage industry such as Penso Power and BW ESS”.

In October 2021 Penso and BW Group announced a joint venture agreement which commits BW to fund the build out of Penso Power’s UK project pipeline totalling more than 3GWh.

ACL Energy was advised by the law firm Eversheds Sutherland.  BW ESS and Penso Power were advised by the law firm Bird & Bird.

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One regional distribution operator, Northern Powergrid, has been accused of foot-dragging on a grid connection, after being unable to improve on a twelve-year wait to hook up one developer’s battery project.

Solar park builder Enviromena has taken the unusual step of issuing a public statement, accusing the DNO of “stifling” investment. The developer accuses Northern Powergrid of jeopardising the viability of its unbuilt farm at West Sleekburn, Northumberland.

Enviromena says its 30MW battery addition to the plant received planners’ approval in October 2022. But after talks, the DNO now can guarantee no grid connection date for the intended battery before October 2036.

According to the developer, Northern Powergrid indicated in discussions last year that its grid supply point at Blyth might enable an earlier connection, possibly available under the DNO’s Delegated Technical Limits programme.

The developer had hoped to confirm that earlier connection date before Christmas. But Northern Powergrid later told it that the Blyth hub had been removed from the DNO’s programme of accelerated connections, due to technical reasons. The developer says the grid company can commit to no alternative before the already stated deadline twelve years from now.

Enviromena CEO’s Chris Marsh said in a statement: “We are extremely disappointed with the latest delay, which has left a key project without a feasible connection date despite being ready to construct.

“The North East is enjoying a renaissance for clean energy as it emerges as a key hub for renewables, Marsh went on.

“The actions of Northern Powergrid go directly against the Government’s wider agenda to move away from fossil fuels and achieve carbon Net Zero goals by 2050 and it is stifling investment in the area. The delay represents a major setback.”

He added: “We submitted details to Northern Powergrid demonstrating our West Sleekburn project was ready for an earlier connection with both planning and land rights in place.

“The site is ready to provide much-needed storage facilities for cleaner energy. I would urge Northern Powergrid to re-focus their efforts on resolving the issues at Blyth and kickstarting accelerated connections in the area.

“We have seen other network operators across the country accelerate connection dates by as much as thirteen years in recent weeks and we hope a similar resolution can be found for the Sleekburn project.”.

Marsh cited the National Grid’s estimates that Britain will need over 25GW of battery storage, up from 1GW today, if it is to decarbonise the nation’s grid by 2035.

Reading-based Enviromena last month announced it was about to submit a total of 400MWp new unbuilt PV farm proposals for planners’ consideration, en route to an intended 500MWp goal next year.

Responding in a statement, Northern Powergrid confirmed the developer’s account.  The operator said it was working hard to bring forward connection dates for customers with schemes delayed by constraints on the transmission network owned and operated by National Grid.

The DNO commented: “Towards the end of last year, we announced that we would be issuing revised connections offers for some customers, made possible through a programme of delegated technical limits”.

“Customers looking to connect at a major substation at Blyth in Northumberland were included in the proposal for the first phase of this work.

“However, after further scrutiny by ourselves and National Grid, it will not be possible during this stage of the programme and so we’re re-evaluating what we can do to support customers looking to connect to this area of our network.

“We remain committed to working with our customers whose projects are impacted and to keeping them informed about the actions we are taking to accelerate grid connections in our region”.

This afternoon trade body SolarEnergyUK will present to MPs evidence of what it calls connection delays ‘descending into farce’.  Queues to connect to the grid, at both low and high voltage, now surpass 500GW, the group claims, citing a recent estimate by consultancy Roadnight Taylor.

Reforms such as the ‘Technical Limits’ programme, intended to deliver connections for big batteries and generating assets in advance of reinforcements to the transmission grid, would only be possible if output from the new supply assets was cut at source, DNOs have told Solar Energy UK said.

The most permissive limit seen by the body is 63%, in return for a connection date being brought forward by a year. In some cases, said the group, developers have been told that this limit is zero, with not a single solar-powered electron being allowed to flow.

Grid consultancy Novogrid has seen 50 such messages over the past three months, all with curtailment above 90%.

“You couldn’t make it up“, said SolarEnergy UK CEO Chris Hewett. “It is like being told you can open a shop on the High Street, as long as you keep the doors locked.

“This is bizarre behaviour“,  he added, “an apparent attempt by the DNOs to make it look like they are doing something while they still fail to invest in vital upgrades.”

Hewett will present this afternoon to the Commons’ environmental audit committee.  On the same topic also this afternoon, grid commissioner Nick Winser will answer MPs on the committee shadowing the D-ESNZ ministry.  Coverage begins at 14:00; click on the links to view a live TV feed.

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Extending volumes of power hosting for periods beyond two hours is seen as critical to extracting carbon from grids, and balancing a system increasingly reliant on intermittent generation from renewable sources.

Central to Whitehall’s latest thinking is developing a cap and floor price mechanism, analogous to the contracts for difference model successfully deployed in spurring investment to advance wind, solar and hydro electricity.

Deploying up to 20 gigawatts (GW) of long duration electricity storage will result, the document calculates, in system savings of up to £24bn, representing a saving to consumers of 3.3% of the total system costs.

Aimed at investors, power suppliers, storage project developers and technologists, consumer groups and network operators, the views-gathering exercise runs until 5 March.

The department’s call for evidence in July 2021 identified barriers to long duration storage including lack of certainty about revenues, high upfront capital costs and long build times.

Whitehall’s outline thinking offers suggestions for eligibility criteria to regulate participants in storage markets, as well as scenarios developed by D-ESNZ officials for their growth.

Industry and commercial interests have been increasingly pondering the steps needed in financial and technical engineering to bring forward grid-scale long-term power endurance in serious volumes. Consultancy McKinseys initiated its international research group in 2021.

Last winter, consultants Stonehaven advising ‘liquid air’ technologists Highview Power calculated that Britain had wasted as much as £ 60 billion over four winter months alone, through lack of long-term power storage.

Renewables and clean tech trades body the REA two years ago published its own thinking on long-duration power hosting and despatch.

Its head of policy Frank Gordon gave the ministry’s two-month consulation a warm welcome.

“The REA welcomes the publication of proposals to reward the considerable system benefits from longer duration energy storage systems with a new support mechanism. We need much more of this valuable resource, alongside all forms and durations of energy storage, to make the transition to a Net Zero energy system as smooth and cost effective as possible.

”We look forward to discussing the details with Government and our members and working together on implementation as soon as possible.”

Read the government consultation document here.

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In twelve months alone, the nation’s total for battery ventures at all phases of progress surged by over two-thirds, amounting to a headline capacity at year end of 84.8GW.    At last year end, the equivalent figure was 50.3GW, as monitored in the trades body’s ‘Electric Pulse’ members-only survey.

As 2023 closes,  the industry group says British battery capacity, at both industrial and utility or grid scales, breaks down as follows;

Capacity now in full operation stands at 3.5GW. Projects in construction add a further 3.8GW.   A further 24.5GW of projects with planning consent awaiting the first shovel to break ground.  27.4GW have more been submitted for planners’ approval.  Behind them come a total of 25.7GW still on the drawing board, undergoing commercial design, talks of over land  use and access, and technical feasibility.

Broken down, England leads the four home nations.  At 50.8GW, it has 60% of the UK’s gross pipeline; this includes a 2.8GW project, the biggest battery and management system yet to be commissioned.  With a gross total of 29.5GW across all projects, Scotland’s pipeline comes second.

The  trend of developers seeking ever bigger batteries continues its relentless surge, the report notes.  This year’s average unit size in the national power locker comes in at 80MW, up from the 54MW average seen only two years ago, and up from a tiny 2MW a decade ago.

Storage engineers regard a reference 50MW unit as carrying enough power to charge up 2,000 electric vehicles.

Batteries play a key role in modern energy systems, taking up the slack in despatch inevitable as intermittent renewables come to dominate generation.  Power storage is the linchpin for grid operators, seeking at all times to balance the supply of electricity against demand in real time.

Barnaby Wharton, RenewableUK’s director of future electricity systems, commented: “These totals put us well on track to delivering the 30GW of flexibility which the Government says we will need by 2030 to ensure electricity supply always meets demand.

“Getting viable projects connected to the grid is a priority, and industry has welcomed progress on reforming the connections process.

“A two-thirds growth balance in projects coming forward this year demonstrates the huge appetite among investors to enter battery storage’s rapidly growing market.

“While the battery market is booming, we need investment in even larger projects to store energy for longer, unlocking further opportunities for us to scale up this cutting-edge technology. We’re still waiting for the Government to confirm how they will stabilise revenues for long duration projects.”

With a heavy majority of new battery projects yielding only two hours’ supply, some storage experts argue however that longer duration and capacity, and not simple power rating, should be the new focus for grid-scale units.

From provider Balance Power, commercial director Nick Provost recently argued that developers should be encouraged to shift focus to batteries capable of eight hour support were now more important in spreading supply risk across grid-connected systems.  They could also minimise costs falling on DNO and transmssions operators to remove grid bottlenecks.

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Located on a site 14km south-west of Inverness, the 450MW-rated Red John scheme will capture excess renewable energy, feeding it to grids as needed, and thus strengthening security of supply as Britain’s power network shifts from fossil fuels.  No price was disclosed for the buy.

Vendors ILI first conceived the water battery in 2015 and gained planning consent from Scotland’s government in June 2021.  Based in Hamilton, Lanarkshire, ILI claim a ‘robust’ 4.7GW portfolio of storage projects, both in pumped hydro and in electrochemical technologies.

Confirming its purchase Statkraft declared it demonstrated the enterprise’s commitment to helping Scotland meet its renewable energy targets and strengthening UK energy security.

A final investment decision is awaited. Stratkraft said the project will support ‘hundreds’ of jobs during construction and provide permanent local jobs once operational.

Founded more than 125 years ago, Statkraft is the largest producer of electricity from hydropower in Europe. It operates storage plants in both Norway and Germany, alongside over 350 other hydropower plants, including Rheidol, near Aberystwyth, in Wales.

From its UK head office in Glasgow, Statkraft envisages  at least £2bn of potential future capital investment in Scotland. Its UK assets include wind farms and the Keith Greener Grid Park in Moray. Besides hydropower and battery storage, its technologies of interest include grid stability and green hydrogen. Other projects in planning or under construction together represent.

Statkraft’s UK managing director Kevin O’Donovan said: “We are fully committed to supporting the UK in strengthening its energy security and helping to secure the economic benefits of the net zero transition. The acquisition of this significant pumped hydro storage scheme will play a key role in that.

But O’Donovan went on: “There needs to be an appropriate support mechanism in place, so we’re now looking to the UK government to provide the certainty that will allow us to proceed with confidence.”

Mark Wilson, CEO of ILI, also urged Westminster to provide policies supporting long duration storage.

“There is over 5GW of pumped storage hydro projects in the UK pipeline which will inject billions into the economy and create over 15,000 new jobs. We encourage the UK government to provide the support mechanisms now,” said Wilson.

ILI cites a 2021 study by independent researchers from Imperial College London. It found that just 4.5GW of new long duration pumped hydro storage with 90GWh of storage could save up to £690m per year in energy system costs by 2050, as the UK transitions to a net-zero carbon emission system.

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Victory in the tax battle coincides today with standards body the MCS confirming 2023 has again smashed records for solar PV installations.

Up to early December, the Microgeneration Certification Scheme logged 183,022 certified PV installations this year, beating 2022’s full total by one third. Now an estimated 2 million UK homes, plus thousands of commercial buildings, make subsidy-free clean power on their roofs.

After years of representations from industry body SolarEnergy UK, the government this week corrected its anomaly of charging householders 20% VAT on power storage devices retrofitted to homes.  New generating equipment had long attracted 5% VAT at most.

As many as a million homes with rooftop panels may have been put off installing batteries, say installers, when confronted by the VAT anomaly.

From next February, VAT will no longer apply to domestic BESS, ministers announced. The concession also covers water-source heat pumps and diverters, a technology that redirects excess power from solar or other renewables to a specific load or appliance, usually a water heater.

Despite the VAT wrinkle, battery installations at both initial and retrofit stages have grown wings this year.  Today’s MCS figures reveal a total 4,400 of the nation’s 4,700 MCS-certified BESS devices were installed in 2023, nearly 800 in November alone.

Numbers of contractors accredited by the MCS to intall storage devices have mushroomed this year, from 50 in January to over 850 now.

Heat pumps, insulation, draught-proofing and other energy-saving equipment for home use have been exempt from VAT since the chancellor’s 2022 Spring Statement. The exemption also extended to purchase of home-scale batteries or BESS when installed at the same time as generating panels.

Falling prices of new home-scale batteries have mirrored the earlier drop in price of domestic solar generation.  That has led more and more homeowners with panels to approach battery installers in quest of increased savings from the generation kit.

Another knock-on effect, say industry reps, has been slowing home owners’ uptake of batteries for use in time-shifting and flex exercises, brought in by suppliers to relieve grid stress by paying homes to cut their electricity consumption or shift it into overnight use.

In a debate on the Energy Prices Act 2022 last year, LibDem Lord Foster of Bath said: “With more efficient and cheaper batteries now available, it makes sense for those with older systems to add a battery. The solar energy their panels generate can be used far more efficiently to the benefit of the homeowner and the country overall. However, the 20% VAT rate is likely to deter many.”

Trade body SolarEnergyUK had long lobbied on the issue, and were dismayed it had not featured in Chancellor Hunt’s Autumn Statement last month.

Chris Hewett, chief executive of the SolarEnergy UK trade group welcomed this week’s victory

“Although a long time coming, this is great news for sustainable energy in the UK“, said Hewett.

“Installing a battery energy storage system can double the savings offered by a home solar installation, so with energy prices as they are, retrofitting one is a great decision,” he said.

Heat pump installs hit records

Today’s MCS data shows installations of heat pumps are at record peaks, as consumers hedge against continuing high bills from suppliers.

More than 35,000 installations of air source or ground/water source technologies were registered in 2023. This figure brought the UK to over 200,000 certified heat pump installations since 2008.

Heat pump uptake remained high in the second year of the Government’s Boiler Upgrade Scheme (BUS), launched in May 2022 to encourage households across England and Wales An initial £5,000 incentive to strip out boilers was this year upped to £7,500.

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Re-opening old mine shafts across the globe and extending the lives of those approaching closure are the focus of GraviStore, the Edinburgh firm’s proposal for rapidly dispatchable clean power, including potentially at grid scale.

Today’s deal commits the multinational giant to assist Gravitricity in developing its alternative to pumped hydro storage and to battery chemistries relying on lithium and other rare metals.

Employing ABB’s knowledge of hoist engineering in deep shafts worldwide holds out potential, the parties believe, to give purposeful second life to scores of thousands of existing, often declining facilities.

Unlike batteries relying on chemical storage, Gravitricity says its proprietary technology can assist power storage at various scales over many decades, and without any decline in performance.

The firm says it has already proven Gravitricity technically, thanks to a scale demonstrator in Leith. Now it is exploring the potential to deploy its groundbreaking technology in decommissioned mines worldwide.

ABB contributes unique depth of experience, says the Scots firm, thanks to its record of installing over 1,000 hoist and winches in deep shafts worldwide, including the example pictured.

Under the new deal, ABB will collaborate by providing research and development, product development and engineering teams specialising in the design, engineering and operations of mine hoists and mechanical, electrical and control technologies for hoisting.

Mine operators in Europe, India and Australia are already showing interest in Gravitricity’s offering, according to the firm’s co-founder Martin Wright.

“As the world generates more electricity from intermittent renewable energy sources, there is a growing need for technologies which can capture and store energy during periods of low demand and release it rapidly when required,” Wright noted.

“Our GraviStore underground gravity energy storage uses the force of gravity to offer some of the best characteristics of lithium-ion batteries and pumped hydro storage – at low cost, and without the need for any rare earth metals.

The Swiss-Swedish multinational sees its co-development with the Edinburgh start up as another route in working with companies providing adjacent and value-adding technologies.

“ABB has 130 years of history with mine hoists, since we first electrified one in Sweden in the 1890s”, said Charles Bennett, global service manager in ABB’s process industries division.

“Collaborating with Gravitricity shows how we can continue to diversify and adapt our technologies,” “We are eager to progress….as we become part of the next generation of renewable energy storage systems and to make use of mine shafts that are no longer in service.”

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The projects will both be located at greenfield sites, with one situated south of Glasgow at Cathkin, and the second at Broxburn, west of Edinburgh.

Construction is scheduled to begin before March, with both sites expected to be fully operational by April. Grid connection will be through SP Energy Network’s 33kV distribution network.

Both projects will help ENGIE towards its 10GW target of battery storage globally.

Aidan Connolly, head of battery storage UK at ENGIE, stated the utilities company was looking forward to working with Canadian Solar on the construction of the project, having signed two energy performance certificate (EPC) contracts for both 50MW/100MWh sites.

Canadian Solar’s e-Storage – previously CSI storage – is a subsidiary of the company’s manufacturing division. It launched its utility-scale energy storage product, SolBank in September 2022.

Renewable energy investor Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (CIP), recently confirmed that SolBank will be the technology used for its 500MW/1,000MWh battery energy storage system (BESS) in Scotland.

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Calculated by the ESO as six times the capacity of the Hinkley C nuclear plant, the ‘twenty gig’ offer is split 50:50 between already flagged regional distribution schemes, and higher-voltage transmission networks.   NG-ES says today’s announcement is in line with its five-point plan for hook-ups.

Over the Grid’s high-voltage transmission spine, 19 amp-hosting projects totalling around 10GW will be offered new dates to plug in, averaging four years earlier than current expectations.

The ESO’s removal of its insistence on non-essential checks before any battery is connected, a concession long sought by developers, enables today’s acceleration.

Over its lower-voltage distribution network spanning the Midlands, south west England and south Wales, an additional 10GW of unlocked capacity already announced will speed the process. The Grid portrays its initiative as bringing forward ‘shovel ready’ schemes by up to five years.

National Grid say it has talked to more than 200 projects interested in fast-tracking distribution hook-ups.  Sixteen say they want to plug in before late 2024, with another 180 looking to connect within two to five years.

The privatised NG-ESO is the monopoly which controls the contractual relationships governing the connection of new generation sites.

Prioritising shareholder pay-outs over essential upgrades to switches and cables is often cited by critics & clean power developers as causing waits of a decade or more to plug in new wind and solar farms.

Last month Common Wealth, a Labour-aligned think tank, reported that the privatised Grid had paid just short of £ 28 billion in dividends since privatisation in 1986. Achieving Net Zero by mid-century will require between £40 bn and £110 in network upgrade, they said with the costs likeliest to fall on customers or taxpayers.

The left-leaning analysts calculated that decarbonising Britain’s grid as expected by 2030 will require building five times the length of high-voltage backbone as were completed in the past thirty years.

Today’s acceleration will be delivered by National Grid Electricity Transmission (ET), the ESO’s arm charged with designing and building in England and Wales’ transmission infrastructure.

The passing into law two weeks ago of the 2023 Energy Act has also helped the initiative.  It will see the Grid’s duties as an ‘energy systems operator’ widened into its imminent replacement, a ‘future systems operator’.

ET president Alice Delahunty declared:  “We’re committed to speeding up connections and creating a ‘fit for the future’ process for plugging projects into the grid.

“Bringing these battery projects forward is one of a range of actions that our business is delivering to unlock clean energy capacity in England and Wales”.

NG-ESO chief engineer & head of networks Julian Leslie added:  “We’re pleased to see the tangible delivery against one of the key points of our five-point plan to speed up connections to the transmission grid for battery and storage projects.

“We’re evolving our network and taking the lead on speeding up connections to make our power system fit for the future, to deliver net zero and keep clean power flowing to the growing number of homes and business across Great Britain, fuelling our economy”.

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Three year old Tag claims 1GW of its total of just under 12GW of solar, wind and battery storage assets are either already operating or under construction.  Besides the UK, its projects span Portugal, Spain, France and Australia.

Its Lakeside battery and storage asset, the subject of the latest financing deal, is located in Selby, north Yorkshire, conveniently close to the Drax power station, pictured.  The device is rated at 100MW/200MWh.

Construction of the project began two months ago, with the associated energy park due to go fully live by mid-2024.

TagEnergy bought the storage project outright from developers RES in December 2021. At that time, it was TagEnergy’s fifth investment in Britain.

In its coal-burning years, Drax was notorious as Britain’s biggest single carbon-emitting plant.  Ceasing fossil fuel combustion entirely this April after 15 years of transition, four of Drax’s six furnaces now rank together as Britain’s biggest single generator of renewable energy, using its rated 2.6 MW capacity to pump out 14 TWhs every year by burning US-sourced wood pellets.

That controversial energy source prompted Professor Sir John Beddington, the government’s former chief scientific advisor, to call in April on the Drax Group to retract its repeated claims that biomass pellets are ‘carbon-neutral’.

Lenders Santander, Rabobank, and Triple Point compiled up to £70m of non-recourse debt on a fully merchant basis to get the Lakeside battery up and humming. Their deal does not address Capacity Market revenues.

The deal gives the lending trio leeway to incorporate further assets into its funding structure.

As Lakeside’s funding arrangements are nailed down, TagEnergy has named Tesla, Habitat Energy and the site’s initial developer RES as its project partners.

As engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contractor, Tesla will provide the device’s Megapack 2XL lithium-ion batteries. Habitat Energy will optimise the installation, and manage its routes to market. RES has been engaged to manage the asset.

TagEnergy CEO Franck Woitiez greeted the deal: “Securing a single non-recourse debt package without a revenue floor is testament to the value our innovative approach to financing offers the market. We’re excited to now move to the next stage of the project to accelerate the energy transition.”

Mark Cumbo, Santander UK’s director of specialised and project finance said: “Santander UK is delighted to have once again supported TagEnergy with funding for the construction and operation of a new BESS asset and supporting the growth of their activities in the UK.

“The investment in BESS assets in the UK, like Lakeside, are a key enabler for the increasing penetration of renewable generation assets and the wider Net Zero transition.”

The debt was arranged by IDCM as financial advisor, with TLT serving as borrower legal advisor, Burges Salmon as lender legal advisor, Aurora Energy Research as energy analytics provider, Everoze as technical advisor, WTW as insurance advisor, Ester as hedge advisor and RSM as the model auditor.

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Last winter the NG-ESO ran its first two batches of national trials for its DFS, designed to gauge how responsive home power users are – or could made to be – to messages that time-shifting will save them money.

As part of the experiment, the NG-ESO and participating suppliers advertised the cash advantages to homes who switched heavy usage devices such as washing machines to run overnight or outside times of peak power demand.

Results of the trials, as analysed on behalf of one battery vendor, were released this morning.  Kit retailer SolarEdge is heralding their insights as a ‘game changer’ in the promotion of home storage of electricity.

Unlike ‘manual turn-down’ participants, owners of SolarEdge’s Home Battery earned financial rewards for their stored battery power during peak hours, without having to reduce their electricity usage.

Consumption monitoring company Smart Metering Systems (SMS) used SolarEdge’s smart control technology to charge participants’ batteries remotely ahead of each DFS event and then maximize power export to the grid over the hours of the DFS event’s duration.

Autonomous control removed the need for homeowners possessing Solar Edge batteries to tweak the times when they ran high-consuming household devices.

The company’s analysis finds that participating battery owners earned up to ten times more financial rewards than participants paid by the DFS for manually tweaking – “time-shifting” – usage by big household appliances.

The highest financial reward received by a battery owner during a single DFS event was £25.60, against an average reward received of £6.52. In comparison, UK manual turn-down participants in the DFS trails received only £0.90 or so per DFS event on average.

In the six DFS events which SolarEdge batter owners participated in, the highest total reward achieved by a battery participant was £100.61. Projections by Smart Metering Systems suggest that if the DFS service becomes an enduring year-round service, domestic battery owners could earn over £300 per year.

The National Grid benefitted too from the DFS’ cuts in demand, through power flows re-scheduled to times when the grid could accommodate them.

Analysts found that participating battery-equipped homes were up to six times more effective in trimming back grid demand than UK homeowners manually twiddling appliances’ knobs. On average, battery-enabled participants exported 2.7 kWh to the grid per DFS event, compared to a reduction of 0.5 kWh or less posted by the average manual turn-down participant.

Mark Hamilton, managing director for FlexiGrid at analysts SMS, concluded: “Introducing automation into the DFS has game-changing potential to amplify significantly the volume of homeowner participation next winter and in future DFS events, and subsequently boost the impact of grid stabilization using home batteries.

“The ability to remotely schedule participants’ batteries to autonomously charge ahead of each DFS event and maximize power export to the grid”, said Hamilton, “means homeowners can earn passive income while consuming electricity as normal.

“This is in contrast to the DFS participants required to actively change their behaviour to earn energy bill savings. This was a key factor in the drop-off of participation we saw as the national DFS scheme went on.”

From home storage vendor SolarEdge, its Western Europe regional manager Amit Larom oberved: “We’ve seen first-hand the significant value battery-enabled flexibility response delivers to homeowners and grid operators alike.

“Home batteries enable homeowners to lower their energy bills and increase their savings by leveraging excess solar during evenings when electricity tariffs are at their highest.

“Participating in demand response programmes can further help improve the economics of purchasing a home battery”, said the SolarEdge salesperson.

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