A 50MW/100MWh battery energy storage system, the largest in continental Europe, has been inaugurated in Belgium by developer Corsica Sole.
The system in the French-speaking region of Wallonia came online last week (1 December), and is the first of three 100MWh projects in Belgium that have been slated to come online before the end of the year (more details further down).
The project’s development was led by Corsica Sole, while developers Yuso and InnoVent were project partners. EV and energy storage firm Tesla provided its MegaPack utility-scale battery storage product for the system (pictured), which is in the district of Deux-Acren.
The system will help to ensure the stability of frequency in the European electricity network. The main way battery systems do this is through participating in Frequency Control Reserve (FCR), which will be gradually replaced by a pan-European service called automatic frequency restoration reserve (aFRR).
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As well as helping to regulate the frequency of the grid, the system will mitigate the intermittency of renewable energy sources by providing load shifting services.
Developer Yuso, one of the project partners in the Wallonia project, is also involved in the development of another 100MWh system in Belgium, providing optimisation services under a 10-year deal. That four-hour system (25MW power) is set to come online before the end of the year, while another 25MW/100MWh system from commodities trading company Trafigura in the municipality of Balen was also slated to come online in 2022.
Corsica Sole said the project totalled €33 million (US$34.7 million) of investment.
“This project is an important step for the development of electricity storage solutions in Europe,” said Michael Coudyser, managing director of Corsica Sole.
“We financed this project with our shareholder Mirova Energy Transition 5 without having recourse to any public subsidy. By demonstrating that the large-scale deployment of batteries is economically viable, we provide proof that we can build a world based on renewable energy coupled with energy storage.”
The Paris-headquartered firm has previously completed storage systems on the Mediterranean island of Corsica, an overseas territory of France, as previously reported by Energy-Storage.news. Asset manager Mirova acquired a stake in the firm in April 2021.
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