The rise of battery energy storage systems (BESS) is increasingly being described as a “new era” in the energy sector.
The reason is that these technologies have the potential to transform the electricity system, stabilize renewable energy sources, reduce electricity price peaks and diversify the energy mix.
Bulgaria already has a concrete example - the battery in Lovech, which is the largest in the European Union and fifth in the world (at the time of obtaining the permit). With an installed capacity of 124 MW and a storage capacity of 496 MWh, the “Advance Green Energy“ project, which has been operating for only a few months, is already changing the energy landscape in Bulgaria.
The electricity storage facility was presented at a special event attended by: Deputy Minister of Energy Krasimir Nenov; Economic Advisor to the European Commission Representation in Bulgaria Neno Nenov; Executive Director of “Advance Green Energy“ Georgi Domuschiev; and business representatives.
The investment in the project is worth 146.7 million BGN. Own funds, co-financed through a loan from the global bank Citi, are 89 million BGN, and nearly 58 million BGN are financial assistance under the Recovery and Resilience Plan, Restore measure.
The battery complex is composed of 16 modules, each with a capacity of 31.3 MWh and a power of 7.8 MW, with 111 lithium iron phosphate (LFP) batteries, which have established themselves as the best energy storage solutions on the market. Each charge and discharge takes 4 hours. The project is also equipped with an intelligent management system, which significantly contributes to the efficient operation of the facility.
Deputy Minister of Energy Krassimir Nenov congratulated the investors for the courage to build such a facility, noting that it fits into the focus of the department on electricity storage.
Your contribution to having such a large-scale facility is extremely valuable and I hope that the remaining investments under the procedure “National Infrastructure for Storage of Electricity from Renewable Sources“ will also contribute to the goals regarding electricity storage systems“.
The construction of the facility was completed within just 6 months, and on April 30, 2025, it received a Permit for Use No. ST-05-236. This is also the largest investment in the Municipality of Lovech in recent years – a region with a low degree of industrialization and high unemployment rates, which gives additional socio-economic significance to the project.
These projects will allow new RES facilities to join the Bulgarian system.
In an extremely short period of time, we have built a large, reliable and well-functioning facility“, added one of the investors in the project, Georgi Domuschiev.
In his words, without a grant, the return on such projects would have been very difficult and risky if Bulgaria had not managed to save the funds under the PVU and implement these systems.
We are also a large industrial consumer. Bulgaria has the highest price of electricity, which makes our industry extremely uncompetitive, and with the introduction of such facilities, more electricity is produced from green energy.“
With these batteries, all the peaks that we have at certain hours of the day will be “smoothed“, which means cheaper electricity for industry and households.
In addition to the purely ecological value of such facilities, this will make Bulgaria more competitive compared to other member states of Europe and the world“, said Georgi Domuschiev.
He explained to journalists that “Advance Green Energy“ plans to install batteries at its plants in Razgrad and Peshtera, which will be between 130 and 180 MWh.
This publication was created in implementation of contract BG-RRP-4.034-0107-C01 “Construction and commissioning of an electric energy storage facility“, procedure BG-RRP-4.034 “National infrastructure for storing electricity from renewable sources“, financed through the Ministry of Economy. All responsibility for the content of the document lies with the final recipient “Advance Green Energy“ AD.
Source: www.economic.bg