EDF and SWGT announce optimisation agreement for flagship battery project

The partnership will see SWGT’s 30MW utility scale battery storage asset optimised through EDF’s trading platform, Powershift

11 Dec 20 by Engerati

EDF and SWGT announce optimisation agreement for flagship battery project

SWGT, an independent battery storage asset manager in the UK, has recently signed an innovative long-term battery optimisation agreement with EDF.

As part of the partnership, SWGT’s 30MW utility scale battery storage asset will be optimised across a variety of grid flexibility schemes, as well as through EDF’s trading platform, Powershift. The agreement will also provide income stability through the delivery of a ‘floor price’, ensuring minimum income levels are guaranteed.

The agreement provides SWGT and its investors with certainty that it will achieve an attractive return and leverage EDF’s industry leading trading expertise to ensure access to all revenue streams available, including the wholesale market and grid services, such as Dynamic Containment. This new partnership brings the total amount of assets under optimisation by EDF to 255MW.

SWGT is becoming one of the UK’s largest independent battery storage asset owners, developers and operators, with a pipeline of more than 180MW.

This project supports the growth of renewable energy sources by providing up to 65GWh of annual energy import and export capacity to the National Grid during its phase one development, which are critical to meeting the UK’s carbon emission reduction targets.

In addition, with its 25-container all-in-one lithium ion integrated battery storage solution, the project reduces energy transmission pressure and costs, and provides significant contribution to the future flexibility and grid stability.

Olivia He, chief investment officer at SWGT, said: “This project is testimony to the resilience of the energy transition fuelled by innovation and a strong appetite for renewable energy from investors. Phase One establishes a solid foundation for SWGT’s growth ambition and vision to become the preeminent UK renewable energy sponsor, supporting the integration of low-carbon power generation locally and worldwide.

“By bringing together the leading-edge expertise of our energy management partner, EDF, into a scalable, capital and risk efficient structure, we have created a launch pad for capital deployment into the decarbonisation, decentralisation and digitisation of the new energy market.”

Adam Clarke, commercial lead at EDF added: “We’re pleased that SWGT has chosen to partner with EDF on this project because of the level of expertise the EDF optimisation team have and also, our commercial scale as an organisation in the distributed energy asset management sector.

“We’ve been able to offer SWGT a long-term deal that not only creates an attractive revenue scheme but also provides bankable reassurance through the floor price, whilst also delivering on our ambition to help Britain achieve Net Zero.”