We outline the key factors for borrowers and lenders to consider when financing battery storage projects, based on our experience working on one of the first UK battery storage project financings. 1. Complex revenue streams Battery storage projects rely on more complex “stacked” revenue streams than traditional energy generation projects.
While financing the storage of electricity has often been carried out on a low-leveraged, corporate or portfolio basis, as the size of battery projects increases, we are now seeing more typical SPV non-recourse project finance structures, with a full security package.
Energy can be stored in a number of ways, depending on the source, but the most common is in chemical batteries. In this briefing, we look at some of the considerations for financing battery storage projects. Why chemical batteries? Chemical batteries are ideal for energy storage for a number of reasons: They are easily scalable.
Regulatory issues Battery energy storage is considered generation for regulatory purposes and requires a licence from Ofgem under the UK Electricity Act 1989 unless an exemption applies (for example, being a smaller capacity).
The Commission adopted in March 2023 a list of recommendations to ensure greater deployment of energy storage, accompanied by a staff working document, providing an outlook of the EU’s current regulatory, market, and financing framework for storage and identifies barriers, opportunities and best practices for its development and deployment.
These studies point to more than 200 GW and 600 GW of energy storage capacity by 2030 and 2050 respectively (from roughly 60 GW in 2022, mainly in the form of pumped hydro storage). The EU needs a strong, sustainable, and resilient industrial value chain for energy-storage technologies.