Investment and IPP news from across Europe, with DTEK buying a BESS project in Poland, Ingrid inaugurating one in Sweden and Triodos investing in a German portfolio.

Although the government in Poland has taken steps to open up its energy storage market, regulatory challenges remain.

Fluence has deepened its partnership with Ukraine-headquartered energy company DTEK, agreeing to supply a large-scale battery storage project in Poland.

IPP Neoen has enlisted BESS supplier NHOA Energy for its first energy storage project in Italy.

Greater deployment of renewable energy and battery storage in Illinois would help mitigate soaring costs of capacity market auctions in PJM Interconnection territory.

Japan’s energy storage market is experiencing a wave of significant growth, as ESN Premium hears from Eku Energy and BloombergNEF.

Private equity firm KKR’s investment vehicle ContourGlobal has acquired BESS projects in Italy totalling 1.6GW of power and up to 9.5GWh of capacity, with an eye on the MACSE auctions in September.

IPP R.Power Renewables will launch construction on large-scale BESS projects in Romania and Poland in the second half of this year, while Electrica is procuring EPC works for its own BESS project.

The Capacity Market (CM) in Germany will offer a new potential revenue stream for BESS, but not all developers and owner-operators are convinced.

Italy and Spain are set to soar as energy storage markets with multiple gigawatt-hours under construction and much more in the pipeline, but there are questions around the regulatory frameworks driving deployments in each country.