The European Commission has approved a €9 billion (US$10.5 billion) scheme to shore up its energy capacity, which will be open to new and existing projects including energy storage.

TagEnergy has commissioned a 240MW/480MWh project in France while Iberdrola has done the same with a 58MW/120MWh system in Spain, the two largest projects in each country. Meanwhile Engie, ACL Energy and Chint Solar Europe have moved to construction on projects in Belgium, Italy and Germany.

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.

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.

We catch up with James Mills, managing director of UK BESS investor Adaptogen Capital, about UK market dynamics, its expansion into Europe, and BESS capex in 2026 and beyond.

Energy trading firm Second Foundation is building three grid-scale BESS projects in the Czech Republic totalling 307MW this year, with the technology provided by local firm Gaz Energy.

Over 1.4GW/3.4GWh of grid-scale BESS came online in Europe, likely its best month ever, accounting for almost a fifth of global figures.

Multinational power firm Engie has acquired two large-scale BESS projects in Spain, paired with synchronous condensers and has launched construction on a BESS in France.

IPP Akuo will soon start building a 2.75-hour BESS project in Borba, Portugal, integrated into its 181MW Santas solar PV plant.