Engie to build new battery park in port of Antwerp

Energy provider Engie will start the construction of a new battery park in Kallo, in the port of Antwerp, at the beginning of next year. The large-scale project, representing a €100 million investment, should be completed by the summer of 2027.

The park in Kallo will be located on the site of the energy company’s former thermal power plant, which closed in 2011 and has since been thoroughly cleaned up.

Growing demand

By the summer of 2027, 110 battery modules will be installed on an almost two-hectare site. These modules will store renewable energy when there is a lot of wind or sun and re-inject that electricity into the grid when there is a low supply of renewable production. The park will have a capacity of 100 megawatts and a total storage capacity of 400 megawatt hours, or the equivalent of 80,000 home batteries of 5 kilowatt hours.

Engie intends to build three such battery parks in Flanders. By doing so, It wants to respond to the growing demand for flexibility on the electricity grid. The battery park in Kallo is Engie’s second large-scale battery storage project in Belgium, after Vilvoorde’s.

One of Europe’s largest battery parks

Engie has started constructing one of Europe’s largest battery parks in Vilvoorde, near Brussels. The park will have 200 megawatts and an investment of 250 million euros. It will cover the power consumption of almost 100,000 households.

With a combined capacity of 300 MW and a total storage capacity of 1,200 MWh, these battery farms will make an essential contribution to the Belgian electricity grid and Engie’s 2030 strategic objectives in Belgium.

‘Supply and demand’

Vincent Verbeke, CEO of Engie Belgium: “Engie invests in accelerated renewable energy development and solid support for our customers in their decarbonization journey and in flexible energy production and storage. The growing share of renewable energy in the Belgian energy mix often creates imbalances between supply and demand. Together with our existing flexible production park, large-scale battery storage such as in Kallo and Vilvoorde will be essential to manage these imbalances and meet growing flexibility needs.”