Britain’s biggest battery project so far goes live in grid-balancing markets

LinkedIn
Twitter
Reddit
Facebook
Email
The 50MW / 75MWh Thurcroft site in

The UK’s biggest battery storage project so far has been acquired by London Stock Exchange-listed battery storage investor Gresham House Energy Storage Fund and is already participating in numerous grid services markets.

Gresham House said that it has completed its investment in the 50MW / 75MWh Thurcroft battery storage site in South Yorkshire, which is in northern England.

This article requires Premium SubscriptionBasic (FREE) Subscription

Enjoy 12 months of exclusive analysis

  • Regular insight and analysis of the industry’s biggest developments
  • In-depth interviews with the industry’s leading figures
  • Annual digital subscription to the PV Tech Power journal
  • Discounts on Solar Media’s portfolio of events, in-person and virtual

Or continue reading this article for free

The asset has been acquired from Gresham House DevCo and Noriker Power, with Gresham House having acquired a 5% stake in the latter in 2019.

The Thurcroft asset was acquired from the two developers for a total enterprise value of £32.5 million (US$42.32 million), plus up to £0.75 million of deferred contingent consideration. It becomes Gresham House's 11th operational utility-scale battery storage project, bringing the total portfolio to 265MW. 

It is expected that Gresham House's completion of the acquisition of another asset, the 50MW Wickham battery storage site, is to occur shortly. John Leggate CBE, chair of Gresham House Energy Storage Fund, said: “Thurcroft is our largest battery project yet and we’re delighted that it’s now live. The dynamic fluctuations in power on the National Grid during lockdown, and the unassailable rise of wind and solar installations, have sharpened the focus on the need for fast-acting, flexible storage at scale.”

Prior to Thurcroft's completion, the 49MW Red Scar asset was Gresham House's largest, having completed its £32.8 million acquisition in January 2020.

Meanwhile, Flexitricity, a demand response and flexibility energy services provider, contacted Energy-Storage.news to say that the project is already generating revenue and at the same time helping electric system operator National Grid ESO to balance the UK grid.

Gresham House contracted Flexitricity to optimise the asset’s operation following successful work on a previous project.

It has already joined the Balancing Mechanism (BM), which balances demand and supply on the network in real-time and is becoming a common source of revenues for energy storage projects in the UK. Flexitricity’s control room monitors the Thurcroft asset round-the-clock and alters the battery system’s charge and discharge profile accordingly.

Thurcroft is also set to be used in the wholesale markets, as well as tender to provide frequency response ancillary services to the grid. According to Flexitricity, the battery project has already been able to secure “high value” daily contracts for participating in National Grid ESO’s Dynamic Containment market – the grid operator’s newest, much-talked about frequency regulation opportunity.

“Flexibility is a hugely important part of decarbonising the grid and batteries are an excellent source of flexibility. Investors are getting comfortable with the business case for energy storage and it’s great this year to be seeing a number of large batteries coming onto the system, providing more of the rapid response flexibility National Grid ESO needs to maintain system stability,” Andy Lowe, Flexitricity director, said.

“I’m glad to say we’re off to a great start and have been able to optimise revenue for the battery across a range of markets, including securing high prices in the first ever tender round of the newly launched Dynamic Containment service.”

Planning regulations which changed in Britain a while ago could change the landscape for the country’s big battery systems. Over 1GW of utility-scale battery capacity has been deployed already and a recent government ruling lifted certain restrictions and planning hurdles placed on battery projects of over 50MW.

Ben Guest, Gresham House managing director alluded to Great Britain needing “at least 10GW” of energy storage “in the next few years to enable the orderly transition to a renewables-led electricity market” and said that Gresham is targeting 350MW of operational assets by the end of this year.

“In turn, we aim to contribute meaningfully to the UK’s 2050 net zero ambitions, while achieving strong returns for our investors.”

Additional reporting for Energy-Storage.news by Andy Colthorpe. 

The original version of this story appeared on Solar Power Portal

26 August 2025
Sydney, Australia
Building on our successful global portfolio of energy storage network events including our successful Energy Storage Summit Australia, combined with the exponential buildout of large-scale energy storage, we are delighted to launch the inaugural Battery Asset Management Summit Australia in Sydney (26-27 August 2025). The Battery Asset Management Summit has been received worldwide with huge optimism and has quickly established itself as leading event series for connecting asset owners with optimisers, software providers, and many more.
16 September 2025
Athens, Greece
The summit will address the most pressing challenges, opportunities, and trends in the solar power production industry, as well as exploring its complimentary technologies: Energy Storage and Green Hydrogen.
22 September 2025
Bilbao, Spain
The EU PVSEC is the largest international Conference for Photovoltaic research, technologies and applications and at the same time a PV Industry Exhibition, where specialized PV Industry presents technologies, innovations and new concepts in the upstream PV sector. It gathers the global PV community to present and discuss the latest developments in Photovoltaics, to network and to conduct business. It is the world-renowned science-to-science and science-to-industry platform uniquely focused on the global PV Solar sector. The conference scientific programme is coordinated by the European Commission Joint Research Centre.
23 September 2025
Warsaw, Poland
The Energy Storage Summit Central Eastern Europe is set to return in September 2025 for its third edition, focusing on regional markets and the unique opportunities they present. This event will bring together key stakeholders from across the region to explore the latest trends in energy storage, with a focus on the increasing integration of energy storage into regional grids, evolving government policies, and the growing need for energy security.
30 September 2025
Seattle, USA
Our unique audience included potential industrial hydrogen users, energy suppliers, project developers, debt providers and investors, utilities, gas TSOs and government officials. The event went beyond simply focusing on hydrogen and explored the role of other derivatives and P2X applications. Join us next year to find out more about the financial and environmental opportunities of Green Hydrogen.
1 October 2025
London, UK
Join us for the reimagined EV Infrastructure and Energy Summit (previously EV World Congress); your gateway to all things EV infrastructure. This newly-branded Summit is your comprehensive guide to navigating the complexities of EV charging and energy systems essential for driving the EV transition forward. As always, our Summit gathers the world’s leading EV experts in London to share the latest insights and case studies with a diverse audience including charge point operators, installers, manufacturers, fleet owners, local authorities, utilities, DNOs, PV and energy storage suppliers, and destination charging locations. Prepare to be inspired by our carefully curated line-up of speakers offering invaluable insights tailored to the UK market.

Read Next

July 3, 2025
OptiGrid has partnered with Hepburn Energy to optimise a BESS at the 4.1MW Hepburn Wind Project in Victoria, Australia, using AI.
Premium
July 2, 2025
Oregon’s Marion County has become the latest jurisdiction in the US to introduce a moratorium on utility-scale battery storage.
July 2, 2025
Utility company Ameren Missouri has filed an application with the Missouri public service commission (PSC) to construct a natural gas and battery storage facility in the state.
Premium
July 2, 2025
There is now 9.8GWh of large-scale BESS online in the UK, according to the latest data from Solar Media Market Research’s ‘Battery Storage: UK Pipeline & Completed Assets Database’ report.
July 2, 2025
Ex-Tesla CTO’s battery recycling and materials company Redwood Materials has launched a new business unit to repurpose second-life EV batteries for energy storage.

Most Popular

Email Newsletter