Gresham completes £32.8m acquisition of 49MW battery

Gresham House Energy Storage Fund has completed its acquisition of the 49MW Red Scar battery.

The £32.8 million investment takes Gresham’s investment portfolio of operational utility-scale storage projects to 174MW.

The total purchase price includes £1 million of deferred considerations payable in 12 months, subject to the project achieving profitability targets.

The acquisition was first announced in October, and the battery was connected to the grid in December 2019. G99 commissioning tests were also successfully completed last month, Gresham said.

The project, which is located on the Red Scar Business Park by Longridge Road and the M6, was officially passed over to Gresham on 31 December 2019 from its developer, a vehicle owned by Gresham House DevCo and Noriker Power.

It earns revenue primarily through asset optimisation through the wholesale market and the Balancing Mechanism.

Gresham also expects to acquire a further three projects in the coming months, namely two 50MW projects and a 5MW extension to Littlebrook. The acquisitions, which are set to take place once the sites have been commissioned and become operational, will take Gresham’s operational portfolio to 279MW.

December was a month alight with activity for the fund, having also acquired two storage facilities with a total capacity of 50MW from VLC Energy for £29.2 million. It has been expanding its portfolio, raising £41.6 million in October to fund both its existing pipeline and a new pipeline of operational and new build assets.

John Leggate, chairman of Gresham House Energy Storage Fund, said the fund is looking forward to “integrating all these new assets into the fund’s portfolio and adding further projects in H1 2020”.