New Energy World™
New Energy World™ embraces the whole energy industry as it connects and converges to address the decarbonisation challenge. It covers progress being made across the industry, from the dynamics under way to reduce emissions in oil and gas, through improvements to the efficiency of energy conversion and use, to cutting-edge initiatives in renewable and low-carbon technologies.
Power shift: Drax, RWE and Sunotec announce new BESS developments
12/11/2025
News
As Europe’s energy landscape changes, so do its energy suppliers. Three cross-industry investments involving battery storage include Drax entering the short-duration storage market with a 260 MW UK BESS portfolio, RWE repurposing a former nuclear site for Germany’s largest battery project, and Sunotec partnering with Shell on an innovative cross-border financing deal in Central Eastern Europe.
Drax acquires 260 MW BESS portfolio
Power company Drax, operator of the UK’s largest power station of the same name, is expanding its portfolio to include short duration storage for the first time, with the acquisition of three ready-to-build two-hour battery energy storage system (BESS) projects in the country from Apatura. Drax will pay £157.2mn, in staged payments between 2025 and 2028.
The projects are located in Marfleet, Hull, England; Neilston, East Renfrewshire, Scotland; and East Kilbride, Lanarkshire, Scotland. Both Marfleet and Neilston have all necessary planning permissions whilst East Kilbride has a planning application pending. The three sites will have a total installed capacity of 260 MW. Construction on all three is expected to commence in 2026, with the first site in Scotland due to be operational in 2027.
Linked to the transaction, Drax also has an option of a right of first offer over a further eight sites (289 MW) being developed by Apatura.
‘As the UK’s [electricity] network increases its reliance on intermittent renewables, more dispatchable and reliable generation will be required to help keep the lights on when the wind isn’t blowing or the sun isn’t shining,’ comments Drax Group CEO Will Gardiner. ‘This acquisition is our first investment in short duration storage as part of our FlexGen portfolio, supporting UK energy security and a clean power system… In combination with our long duration energy storage, flexible generation and renewable generation from biomass, we will be able to provide 4.4 GW of dispatchable generation to meet demand.’
The UK National Energy System Operator (NESO) forecasts a potential doubling of total demand for electricity in the UK over the coming decades, as well as an increase in curtailment of wind and reduction in dispatchable thermal generation.
Drax’s FlexGen business currently comprises long duration pumped storage, hydro and open cycle gas turbines (OCGTs), but not short-duration BESS with fast response capabilities. Drax believes that once commissioned, two-hour BESS provides as ‘an attractive entry point into the short duration storage space’, allowing it to ‘provide a wider range of system support services, as well as increased access to wholesale and balancing markets’.
Once the BESS assets are operational, the FlexGen portfolio will comprise 1.8 GW of long and short duration storage and flexible generation across nine sites in England, Scotland and Wales, with access to demand side flexibility through the company’s industrial and commercial customer portfolio. Drax Power Station provides 2.6 GW, taking the company’s total to 4.4 GW of dispatchable generation.
RWE breaks ground on Germany’s largest BESS to date
Over in Europe, RWE is building Germany's largest BESS facility to date at the site of two former nuclear power reactors at Gundremmingen, which were closed in 2017 and 2021 respectively and are currently being decommissioned. The 400 MW BESS will have a storage capacity of 700 MWh and will use the site’s existing grid connection.
The Gundremmingen BESS will comprise more than 200 containers housing around 850,000 lithium iron phosphate battery cells capable of supplying electricity continuously for almost two hours. State-of-the-art control technology and over 100 fast inverters will allow it to supply or absorb electricity ‘within milliseconds’, according to RWE, helping to stabilise the power grid. The facility is scheduled to commence commercial operation in early 2027.
In addition to the new BESS, a 55-hectare solar park and a gas-fired power station are also to be built.
RWE is building Germany’s largest BESS facility to date, at 400 MW, at the site of two former nuclear power reactors in Gundremmingen
Photo: RWE
Shell and Sunotec sign cross-border spread hedge agreement supporting long-term energy market stability
Elsewhere on the Continent, European utility-scale solar and BESS company Sunotec has signed a cross-border agreement with Shell Energy Europe which provides long-term price stability for a new BESS project, supporting its financial viability, according to Sunotec.
The five-year agreement is linked to a 600+ MWh BESS project owned by Sunotec, which is under development in Bulgaria and expected to enter commercial operation by 2Q2026.
For Shell, the deal ‘helps to diversify its wider power portfolio in the region’.
The transaction is among the first of its kind in Central Eastern Europe. According to Kaloyan Velichkov, Founder and CEO of Sunotec, the agreement demonstrates how cross-border cooperation and forward-looking financial mechanisms can enhance regional energy market integration and facilitate the deployment of large-scale renewable energy assets.
A solar-plus-storage project in Pernik, Bulgaria
Photo: Sunotec
