Germany’s energy system regulator has confirmed that BESS projects coming online by 4 August 2029 will be exempt from charging and discharging grid fees, opening up investment again after months of uncertainty.
While Germany is often described as the ‘hottest’ energy storage market in Europe, growing uncertainty on multiple policy and regulatory topics has led to a ‘cooling’ of investor interest.
The situation and uncertainty around grid connections and grid fees in Germany is evolving, possibly enabling market participants to look beyond the August 2029 grid fee exemption cut-off date – although uncertainty is still very high.
EDF Power Solutions has commissioned a 50MW/120MWh BESS project in Poland, Eurus has done the same in Hungary, while NGEN and Aretis Group have financed and enlisted optimisers (respectively) for projects in Hungary, Romania, Poland, Slovenia and Latvia.
Invinity Energy Systems has been enlisted to design and deliver the world’s largest flow battery, for a data centre project in Switzerland currently under construction by Flexbase.
Sodium-ion may be increasingly competitive for projects where total lifecycle economics matter more than initial procurement cost alone, the CEO of HyperStrong told us after the system integrator signed a 60GWh supply and co-operation agreement with CATL.
Hungary is entering a new phase of its energy transition, opening up new opportunities for energy storage investment. But bankability is still a challenge, so equity investment is needed, writes lawyer Daniel Orosz.
Lenders are increasingly willing to back large-scale BESS projects in Germany that don’t have any contracted revenues, although that merchant risk is priced in to structures, an executive at Aquila Clean Energy EMEA said.
