Massive deal in Israel’s growing energy storage market

Israel-based wind and solar project developer Enlight Renewable Energy Ltd has agreed to buy around 430MWh of batteries from Chinese inverter and storage system provider Sungrow.

The storage system will be used by the Israeli company for two projects it secured in recent tenders held by the Israel Public Utility Authority for Electricity. 

“We are excited to announce our first strategic procurement agreement in the energy storage arena via the selection of Sungrow’s New ESS Li-ion Solution,” said Enlight CEO Gilad Yavetz. “We believe that the combination of Sungrow’s product leadership and CATL’s cell technology will provide us with the superior solution we need for our advanced solar-plus-battery projects, driving best-in-class plant performance.”

“Sungrow will supply 430MWh of its latest four-hour, liquid-cooled ESS, a combination of a contracted 230MWh for stage one and a locked 200MWh battery for stage two, which enables profitability, flexibility and safety,” Sungrow said in a statement, without revealing more details. “The contract is the largest ESS agreement signed to date in Israel, bolstering the country’s energy transition and marking a massive scale-up in installations for the newly launched system.”

According to Enlight’s annual report for 2020, which was published in March, the Israeli company secured 48MWac of storage capacity in a tender held in July 2020 and another 82MWac in a second procurement exercise held in December 2020. The projects selected in this solar-plus-storage tender were awarded a final price of ILS0.1745/kWh ($0.0562) and will have to begin delivering power to the Israeli grid by July 2023.