Equinor said Jan. 22 it has started operations at the 25-megawatt (MW) Blandford Road commercial battery storage asset in the U.K., marking a company first.

Located in southwestern England’s Dorset, Blandford Road features approximately 150 lithium-ion battery units. Combined, the units are capable of storing enough electricity to power about 75,000 U.K. homes for two hours, Equinor said in a news release. Blandford Road is connected to the Southern Electric Power Distribution Network.

“Equinor envisages a renewables portfolio that combines generation assets such as wind and solar with flexible assets such as batteries to help mitigate the intermittency of the renewable power generation,” Olav Kolbeinstveit, senior vice president for onshore and markets for renewables at Equinor, said in the release.

With a large position in the U.K.’s offshore wind sector, the company is building its battery storage capacity, Kolbeinstveit added. Equinor’s second battery storage asset, the 35-MW Welkin Mill, is under construction in England’s Greater Manchester area. The asset is expected to start operations later this year.

Battery storage company Noriker Power, in which Equinor has a 45% equity stake, is the developer for both Blandford Road and Welkin Mill. The company will operate Blandford Road.

Development of the battery storage assets comes as the U.K. aims for 95% of its electricity to be low carbon by 2030. Battery storage systems, which store excess power generated from renewables such as solar and wind, are seen as crucial for the transition.

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