Gresham House Energy Storage Fund (GRID) has signed a sale and purchase agreement (SPA) for the conditional purchase of a 480MW battery energy storage system (BESS) near Rayleigh, in Essex.
The terms of the acquisition are subject to the project receiving a favorable “Gate 2” connection offer, expected between September 2026 and January 2027.
Once completed, the acquisition would be the fund’s largest BESS project in its portfolio, both operational and under development. Currently the largest operational BESS is the 100MW Melksham, an almost fivefold increase, while representing a doubling of two 240MW projects in the pipeline of the fund’s three-year plan.
“Rayleigh is an exciting project for GRID in terms of its enormous size, strategic location and of course the potential return on investment and positive expected impact on the company’s NAV per share. This project alone would add almost 50% to the installed capacity of the currently operating portfolio and significantly expand the new project pipeline already announced in our three-year plan,” said Ben Guest, manager at GRID and managing director at Gresham House Asset Management’s Energy Transition division.
Guest added that the fund has significant flexibility regarding the duration of the project, with a minimum duration of 2 hours or longer.
Financing completed for 397 MW BESS portfolio
The project acquisition comes just days before the fund completed financing for a 397 MW BESS portfolio with a 2-hour duration for each of the projects.
The portfolio consists of three projects: Cockenzie, Monet’s Garden and Elland 2, acquired in November 2025 – two of which were acquired earlier this year. The 240 MW Cockenzie project is located in East Lothian, Scotland, while the 57 MW Monet’s Garden is located in North Yorkshire, England.
Senior debt financing for the BESS portfolio includes loans totaling £141 million from four lenders that previously worked with GRID.
Furthermore, now that financing for the three projects has been secured, construction will begin on a connection expected to take place in 2027.
First-quarter sales rose 11% year-over-year
These project announcements coincide with the publication of the fund’s net asset value (NAV) for the first quarter of the year. At the end of March 2026, the fund had a net asset value of £651.9 million or 114.56p per ordinary share, an increase of 1.1% on the previous quarter.
Revenue in the first quarter of 2026 grew 11% year-on-year from £15.9 million to £17.7 million, while earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) reached £12.5 million in the first quarter of 2026, compared to £11.2 million in the same period a year ago.
In addition, two GRID projects have recently been revived after expansions. These are the Glassenbury and Stairfoot projects, which have increased capacity from 50MW/38MWh to 50MW/110MWh and 40MW/40MWh to 40MW/120MWh respectively. The expansion of the two projects will add approximately 150 MWh to the fund’s operating portfolio, while two more projects – Red Scar and Rufford – will undergo expansions in the second quarter of 2026.
At the end of the first quarter of 2026, the fund had an operational BESS capacity of 1,072 MW/1,701 MWh.
