Energy storage specialist Eku Energy has secured £45 million in debt financing to fund the construction of a new battery energy storage system (BESS) in the West Midlands.
The finance package has been sourced from NatWest Bank and the Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation (SMBC), and will be used to construct the Ocker Hill BESS, a 99MW/198MWh BESS development located between the towns of Dudley and Wednesbury in the West Midlands.
The Ocker Hill BESS will be built close to the site of the former Ocker Hill coal-fired power station, which operated from 1902 to 1977 and was demolished in 1985. The development, which is Eku Energy’s fourth energy storage project in the UK, is expected to be commissioned in late 2026.
The development will make use of 54 Tesla Megapack batteries and will be constructed by H&MV Engineering, which will serve as the balance of plant contractor for the project. Once completed, SmartestEnergy, which is a 100% owned subsidiary of the Marubeni Corporation, will work as the tolling provider for the development under a ten-year agreement.
Furthermore, SMBC and NatWest have provided Eku Energy with an uncommitted accordion facility of £100 million to fund Eku Energy’s near-term UK projects, including several that Eku Energy recently acquired as part of the recent takeover of the Bluestone Energy BESS portfolio.
The newly-acquired assets have a combined pipeline capacity of 1GW/2GWh and include a 98MW/196MWh project in Leatherhead, Surrey; the 98MW/196MWh Sturts Farm project in Dorset; and two 240MW projects located in Ninfield, East Sussex, and Rochester in Kent.
Elias Saba, chief technology officer at Eku Energy, said that the Ocker Hill BESS will further enable the energy transition and uptake of renewable energy. Eku Energy’s CEO, Daniel Burrows, agreed, adding that the firm’s growing portfolio in the UK reflects the company’s “commitment to deliver safe, secure, and reliable energy storage solutions that will provide cost-effective clean energy”.
Mahul Raval, senior vice president of trading at SmartestEnergy said that the company was “delighted” to partner with Eku Energy on the tolling agreement for the Ocker Hill BESS, adding that the project “shows our commitment to Eku and the BESS business case they built”.
The news follows a recent announcement from Eku Energy, where the firm revealed that it had signed a trading and optimisation services deal with Europe’s largest renewable energy generator, Statkraft. The deal surrounds Eku Energy’s Loudwater battery energy storage system (BESS), a 40MW/55MWh BESS development that is currently under construction.
Statkraft will provide optimisation and trading services for the Loudwater BESS development when it is commissioned, which is is expected to happen in mid-2025.
