Zenobē secures £235 million to develop two battery energy storage projects in Scotland

Published: 15 Feb 2023, 14:35
By George Heynes

The projects were awarded to Zenobē following an application to National Grid ESO’s Stability Pathfinder process. Image: Zenobē Energy

Zenobē Energy has secured a £235 million long-term project finance debt facility structured by NatWest.

The company will use the funding to develop its next two grid-scale, transmission connected battery project storage assets in Scotland with a combined capacity of 400MW/800MWh. The financing comes from Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce, Rabobank, Santander UK, Siemens Financial Services through Siemens Bank and NatWest, and the loan represents the largest project finance facility for battery storage projects to be arranged in Europe, according to Zenobe.

The agreement also includes a £400 million accordion facility that will be used to debt finance expansions at each site as well as future projects. This will enable Zenobē to scale up its total battery storage portfolio in Scotland to over 1GW/2GWh by 2026.

The two projects to be developed are at Blackhillock near Inverness and at Kilmarnock South near Glasgow.

Blackhillock is a 200MW/400MWh site set to go live in the summer of 2024. The Kilmarnock South project, with a capacity of 200MW/400MWh, will go live shortly after. Both could be expanded by an additional 100MW/200MWh.

The projects were awarded to Zenobē following an application to National Grid ESO’s Stability Pathfinder process to improve the long-term stability of the electricity system.

“Securing this first of its kind financing structure is another landmark for Zenobē and our mission to accelerate the grid’s uptake of renewable energy affordably and reliably. This follows the successful arrangement of a private placement to debt finance our existing and pipeline fleet business last year,” said Nicholas Beatty, co-founder and director of Zenobē.

Zenobē announced recently that its 100MW/107MWh Capenhurst battery energy storage system had started delivering reactive power services to the grid. The Capenhurst BESS, located in Chester, is the largest battery project directly connected to the transmission grid anywhere in Europe, according to Zenobē.

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