Gresham House Energy acquires Bloxwich energy storage facility

(Sharecast News) - Battery storage investor Gresham House Energy Storage Fund has acquired a 41MW operational energy storage facility, known as 'Bloxwich', from a group of investors led by Arenko Cleantech, in a deal worth at least £20.1m.
The firm had previously disclosed the project as the 'potential acquisition', and added that it increased the total capacity of operational utility scale battery storage projects in the fund's investment portfolio to 215MW.

It said the facility is located on the Bloxwich Industrial estate in Walsall, the West Midlands, and was developed by Arenko, using their battery software and controls platform.

Post-acquisition, Arenko would still operate and optimise Bloxwich, which was acquired by the Fund for an initial value of £20.1m, with further potential earnout payments.

Bloxwich was commissioned in July 2019, and operates in the Balancing Mechanism, European Power Exchange (EPEX) and other ancillary services markets, such as frequency response.

In mid-May, it was used to provide upward and downward reserve flexibility to National Grid in the UK's first-of-its-kind trial using an energy storage system.

Existing upward and downward reserve services are typically provided by large combined cycle gas turbines and other thermal generation, at a "significant" financial and carbon emissions cost to the UK grid.

Gresham House said that in essence, an energy storage system provides an "exciting, more cost-effective" source of grid flexibility, with the systems likely to be central to a zero-carbon emissions grid of the future.

"Bloxwich is a further step forward in our ambitions to build Great Britain's essential renewable power storage infrastructure," said chair John Leggate.

"We're pleased to welcome Arenko, as one of our partners, to support operational management and trading optimisation at Bloxwich.

"With the operational portfolio now over 200MW for the first time, we continue to make progress executing on our 2020 plan, and we look forward to updating our shareholders."

At 1021 BST, shares in Gresham House Energy Storage Fund were up 0.82% at 109.89p.