Gresham House energy storage fund passes £200m target

Gresham House Energy Storage Fund has sold £41.6 million of new shares in its latest placing, bringing the total raised from investors since its creation in 2018 to roughly £202 million.

The company did not sell the full £57.8 million it was offering but has nevertheless surpassed its £200 million first-year fundraising target.

Chairman John Leggate said: “The fund is now firmly established as the leading player in the UK grid-level energy storage space and has established a strong platform to build on the excellent progress we have already achieved.

“As the proportion of total electricity supply from renewable sources continues to grow in Great Britain, the need and business case for energy storage systems increases. We believe that energy storage has significant potential from an institutional investment standpoint and is the key to the renewable energy future in the UK.”

The fund currently has an operational portfolio of six utility-scale energy storage systems with a combined capacity of 75MW. Subject to successful commissioning and acquisition, it is aiming to raise the total to 229MW by the end of the first quarter of 2020.

It also has a further six projects totalling 240MW in development and is scoping out another four operational facilities with a combined capacity of 95MW.

Meanwhile, the fund manager Gresham House New Energy has awarded a contract to Kiwi Power to operate its 15MW Lockleaze battery storage facility near Bristol which is expected to come online later this month.

The aggregator will use its technology platform to quickly identify the best earning opportunities across multiple revenues streams, whilst taking into account the degradation costs of each potential action, and then automatically dispatch the asset.

The company said the amount of energy storage under its control is on track to hit 80MW by the end of this year.