Danish giant sells giga-scale battery as project readies to hit the grid

Danish energy giant Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (CIP) is selling its Summerfield battery in South Australia, which when energised in May will be the state’s first giga-scale storage unit. 

The 240 megawatt (MW), 960 megawatt hour (MWh) battery is now in the hands of Intera Renewables, the local arm of Sydney-based Palisade Investment Partners. 

Palisade partner Simon Parbery says the project is the company’s second big battery investment.

CIP bought the project in 2022, just after the originator Sapgen won state development approval and just before it was referred to the federal EPBC. 

It was due to cost $250 million to build, according to the state development application in 2021, and last year secured a 10-year off-take agreement with Origin Energy, Australia’s biggest energy retailer.

Construction is “materially complete” and commercial operations are scheduled for later this year, CIP says.

CIP’s Thomas Wibe Poulsen claimed the glory for derisking the project “demonstrating our ability to manage risk and deliver value to our investors”. 

“The Summerfield project clearly illustrates CIP’s capability to deliver through each stage of a project’s lifecycle, having successfully delivered all key development workstreams and with construction now substantially complete,” he said in a statement. 

CIP has one other battery under development, the 100 MW, 200 MWh Winterbourne battery adjoining the wind project of the same name.

CIP is one of the biggest renewable energy investors in the world, and is invested in what is expected to be Australia’s first offshore wind farm in Victoria, Star of the South, but the Summerfield battery was its first such project in this country. 

The Summerfield battery will provide grid support as South Australia prepares to reach “net” 100 per cent renewables next year.

But it won’t hold the title of as the state’s biggest battery for long.

Alinta is currently building the 250 MW, 1000 MWh stage of its Reeves Plains battery, with a second stage of the same size waiting in the wings. 

Both are huddled next to a proposed 300 MW gas power station. It received planning approval eight years ago but is still in development.  

The Summerfield project’s history says a lot about the energy transition circle across the country, and what is happening in South Australia.

The site near Tepko, east of Adelaide, was supposed to host a 300 MW gas power plant with a small 12 MW solar farm backup and 30 MW battery. 

By 2021, that plan shrank to just a very large battery.

And yet today, DC-coupled solar-batteries are very much on trend in the renewables industry across Australia as developers rush to give the final owners more flexibility about when the electricity hits the grid. 

Gas power is also back on the table, as the likes of EnergyAustralia revive long-dead plans for the 1,430 MW Marulan gas power plant in New South Wales (NSW), and Squadron Energy lodge a planning application for the 400 MW Illawarra firming power station also in NSW. 

And yet, in South Australia, the country’s most advanced state when it comes to renewable energy, standalone solar is again on the nose.

Just yesterday UK-based Revera Energy dumped plans to build a 500 MW solar farm in South Australia, saying the solar part wasn’t economically viable.  Instead it’s doubling the size of the separate standalone battery to help absorb the volumes of wind and solar washing through the state. 

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