Gresham House Energy Storage Fund's Wickham Market battery, part of the company's acquisition spree this year. Image: GRID.
Gresham House Energy Storage Fund (GRID) has conditionally agreed to acquire a c.30MW battery project known as Byers Brae.
The site is located near Wester Dechmont, Livingston in West Lothian, Scotland, and is a battery-only project currently being developed by Gresham House DevCo and Noriker Power.
It is expected to be commissioned in Q2 2021, and being generating revenue from asset optimisation explained GRID. It will trade in the wholesale market, and National Grid ESO’s Balancing mechanism, as well as providing frequency response services.
Ben Guest, fund manager and head of Gresham House New Energy, said: “Byers Brae is our first project in Scotland and is expected to help National Grid balance wind generation in the north with power demand in the south. It is located at a point between Edinburgh and Glasgow where physical constraints exist in the transmission system and is therefore expected to benefit from additional revenue System Actions in the Balancing Mechanism.”
It is the most recent acquisition in what has been a busy year for GRID, bringing the total capacity of operational utility-scale battery storage project in its investment portfolio to 345MW.
| Project | Location | MW |
|---|---|---|
| Staunch | Staffordshire | 20 |
| Rufford | Nottinghamshire | 7 |
| Lockleaze | Bristol | 15 |
| Littlebrook | Kent | 8 |
| Roundponds | Wiltshire | 20 |
| Wolverhampton | West Midlands | 5 |
| Glassenbury | Kent | 40 |
| Cleator Moor | Cumbria | 10 |
| Red Scar | Lancashire | 49 |
| Bloxwich | West Midlands | 41 |
| Thurcroft | South Yorkshire | 50 |
| Wickham | Suffolk | 50 |
| Byers Brae | West Lothian, Scotland | 30 |
| Total | 345 |
Additionally, a further 25MW project is in the advanced stages of due diligence and a further 10MW capacity is expected to be commissioned at the Glassenbury project GRID noted.
In November, GRID announced that it had successfully raised £120 million in its most recent fundraising round. This will be used to finance six new energy storage projects with a total capacity of 245MW, which Byers Brae forms part of.
Also in November, the company completed the acquisition of the 50MW Wickham battery project for £32.75 million. Similarly, it acquired the 50MW/75MWh Thurcroft battery storage site for a total enterprise value of £32.5 million, plus up to £0.75 million of deferred contingent consideration.
In September, it also acquired two new development rights for 50MW projects - called Monet’s Garden and Lister Drive - from Arenko. This followed the acquisition of the operational 41MW Bloxwich energy storage site in July from Arenko, for £20.1 million.
Our publisher Solar Media will be hosting the Energy Storage Summit 2021 in an exciting new format on 23-24 February and again on 3-4 March. See the website for more details.