Key Capture Energy’s two-hour New York grid-scale battery project progresses with unionised labour

LinkedIn
Twitter
Reddit
Facebook
Email

Key Capture Energy is in the construction phase of a battery storage system in New York that will inform how the developer approaches much bigger projects in the state.

Key Capture Energy’s KCE NY 6 is a 20MW/40MWh (two-hour duration) lithium-ion battery energy storage system (BESS) just south of Buffalo, in Upstate New York.

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 project is being built with unionised labour through local branches of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW), United Steelworkers and Communications Workers of America. Key Capture Energy said yesterday that this was made possible by its construction contractor, Black & McDonald.

Key Capture Energy is headquartered in Albany in the Upstate region. The developer delivered New York State’s first-ever grid-scale battery storage system, KCE NY 1, which was commissioned in 2019. That 20MW system was also the first project to benefit from state-level incentives through a programme from the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA).

KCE NY 6 and two other Key Capture Energy projects (KCE NY 2 and KCE NY 11, both also 20MW) will also be receiving money from the NYSERDA programme, called the Bulk Energy Storage Incentive Program. At the time the award to KCE NY 1 was announced, the company said the incentives were the path to “monetising millions” of dollars from the New York projects.

Energy-Storage.news reported in November 2021 as construction of KCE NY 6 began that according to Key Capture CEO Jeff Bishop, the developer had a development portfolio of 1,000MW in New York State at the time. New York has a statewide policy target to deploy 6,000MW of energy storage on its grid by 2030, helping to leverage renewable energy generation from less population dense Upstate and rural areas as well as from offshore wind to be built in the coming years, as it targets a zero emissions electricity sector by 2040.

With the company typically going into a new US transmission operator service area or state market and building smaller projects before scaling up to larger ones, lessons learned from KCE NY 6’s development, construction and commissioning phases would be applied “immediately” to other projects in the portfolio, Bishop said.

Sungrow Americas was announced as the BESS supplier to the project, with the regional energy storage division of Chinese PV inverter manufacturer Sungrow having worked with Key Capture Energy (KCE) on projects in other US regions, including Texas.

In October 2021, KCE placed a 390MW BESS order with Sungrow for projects to be construction towards the end of that year and into this one, as Energy-Storage.news reported. The order was for Sungrow liquid-cooled lithium iron phosphate (LFP) BESS units ranging from one hour to two hours duration.

In December last year, KCE was bought by South Korean energy company SK E&S. SK E&S, an affiliate of major Korean conglomerate SK Group, said that it intended to invest at least a billion dollars into the developer.

This article and headline have been amended from their original form to reflect that the project is in its construction phase currently and not yet nearing completion.

Read Next

May 21, 2025
Regulators in Germany are considering two big reforms that could improve the business case for BESS, while developer-operator Green Flexibility has announced its first major project.
Premium
May 15, 2025
Despite new state incentives for energy storage in New York, some independent power producers (IPP) are still struggling to make progress in the face of local opposition, permitting hurdles and moratoriums.
Premium
May 7, 2025
ESN Premium speaks with King Look, director of research and development at New York utility Con Edison, about implementing long-duration energy storage (LDES) in New York City.
Premium
May 2, 2025
With Riverhead in Suffolk County, New York, dropping plans for a moratorium, Nala Renewables has advanced a standalone BESS proposal.
April 30, 2025
NYSERDA has launched a programme to incentivise residential and retail energy storage in the state, offering a total of US$775 million for energy storage projects.

Most Popular

Email Newsletter