Tauron Polska Energia has bought a ready-to-build battery in Jawor with a 17-year capacity market contract attached. The contract is most of the reason to own the asset. It is also the reason the first two years of operation will look nothing like the fifteen that follow.
Key takeaways
- Tauron Polska Energia has acquired the 28.27 MW and 120 MWh BME Jawor battery storage project in Poland from Griffin Group Energy, in a transaction announced on 20 October 2026 with no disclosed consideration.
- BME Jawor sits at ready-to-build stage, will comprise 40 battery storage containers inside the Walbrzych Special Economic Zone INVEST-PARK, and is scheduled to begin commercial operations in February 2027.
- The project holds a 17-year Polish capacity market contract covering delivery years 2029 to 2045, with remuneration of PLN 264.90 per kW per year, equivalent to $67.97 per kW per year.
- The battery will connect to the network of TAURON Dystrybucja, the buyer's own distribution business, through the 110/20 kV Jawor Strefa substation.
- Enerdatics records 26 Polish battery storage transactions since the start of 2024, of which exactly two carry a disclosed value: $0.241 million per MW on Trzebinia in March 2024 and $0.265 million per MW on Kozienice in September 2025.
What does Tauron own between February 2027 and 2029?
A merchant battery. A capacity market contract is an agreement under which a generator or storage asset is paid a fixed sum per kilowatt of contracted capacity per year, in return for being available when the system operator calls on it. Poland awards these agreements in auctions held several years ahead of the delivery year they cover.
That lead time is what opens the gap here. Jawor is scheduled to reach commercial operations in February 2027, and the agreement it holds runs from 2029. For roughly the first two years of its working life, the asset earns nothing from the contract that justifies owning it.
What it earns instead comes from the wholesale and balancing markets: charging when power is cheap or curtailed, discharging when it is not. Those revenues are real but unpredictable. A buyer underwriting Jawor is underwriting two different assets stacked in sequence, and the riskier one arrives first.
Why can the capacity payment not be multiplied by 28 MW?
Because the Polish capacity market does not contract nameplate power. It applies derating factors that reduce the volume an asset can hold under an agreement, and for storage the factor depends on how long the unit can sustain output. A battery that can run for a few hours is not treated as firm capacity in the way a thermal plant is, so the contracted volume normally sits below the rating on the equipment.
Jawor is unusually well placed on that measure for its size. At 120 MWh across 28.27 MW it holds roughly 4.2 hours of duration, slightly above the four-hour median that Enerdatics finds across the 13 Polish battery transactions since 2024 that state an energy capacity. Longer duration earns more capacity credit per megawatt, which is part of why four hours has become the Polish default rather than the two hours common in older European battery fleets.
The Enerdatics record states the rate of PLN 264.90 per kW per year but not the contracted volume behind it, so the annual payment cannot be derived from the 28.27 MW figure. Anyone multiplying the two will overstate it. The rate tells you what Poland pays per contracted kilowatt for that delivery period, not what this project collects.
What changes when the buyer owns the substation?
The connection stops being a negotiation with a third party. Jawor will connect through the 110/20 kV Jawor Strefa substation, operated by TAURON Dystrybucja, which is the distribution network business inside the same group that is buying the battery. Grid connection terms, timing and curtailment behaviour all sit inside one corporate perimeter.
That matters for a storage asset, because the costs a battery is meant to relieve land on the network rather than on the generator. Tauron has framed the acquisition around grid balancing, integrating renewable output and reducing renewable redispatch, the practice of instructing generators to cut output when the network cannot carry it. A distribution utility that pays for redispatch has a direct interest in owning flexibility on its own feeders, separate from whatever the battery earns in the market.
The counterparties also know each other. Tauron and Griffin Group Energy previously worked together on the development and commissioning of the BESS Dabie and BESS Przewoz facilities, so Jawor is the third asset to pass between them. Mazurkiewicz Cieszynski Mazuro advised the seller.
Enerdatics records 26 Polish battery storage transactions since the start of 2024, and exactly two of them carry a disclosed value. Those two are the 133 MW and 532 MWh Trzebinia project, bought by DTEK Renewables from Columbus Energy in March 2024 for $32.08 million, or $0.241 million per MW, and the 112 MW and 448 MWh Kozienice project, sold by Greenvolt Group to DTEK in September 2025 for $29.73 million, or $0.265 million per MW, a figure Enerdatics identified despite no disclosure by either party. Both assets then changed hands again this month, as Actis bought the two assets behind Poland's entire battery price record. At 28.27 MW, Jawor is the smallest Polish battery transaction in that set of 26, and like 24 of the others it arrives without a price.
What does the deal signal for Polish storage?
It signals that the Polish capacity market is now doing the work a power purchase agreement does elsewhere, and that the timing mismatch it creates is becoming a standard feature of these deals rather than a quirk. Assets are being built to meet a delivery year set years in advance, which leaves a merchant stub at the front end that someone has to be willing to hold.
It also signals who is best placed to hold it. A state-controlled utility with a distribution network and a thermal fleet to replace can absorb two uncontracted years far more comfortably than a fund with a defined holding period. Tauron has been buying what Polish consenting produces rather than what its strategy would prefer, a pattern visible in its wind purchases too, where Poland's priced wind deals and the $494 million outlier showed it taking a 21 MW parcel because that was the size on offer.
The open question is price. Until more than two priced battery prints exist, the market cannot tell whether a long-duration asset with a 17-year contract and a two-year revenue gap is worth more or less per megawatt than one without. Buyers will keep pricing that gap privately.
Frequently asked questions
How much did Tauron pay for the BME Jawor battery project?The consideration was not disclosed. Enerdatics records only two priced Polish battery transactions since the start of 2024, at $0.241 million per MW for Trzebinia in March 2024 and $0.265 million per MW for Kozienice in September 2025, both for assets roughly four times the size of Jawor.
When does the BME Jawor capacity market contract start paying?The 17-year agreement covers delivery years 2029 to 2045 at PLN 264.90 per kW per year. Commercial operations are scheduled for February 2027, so the project will run for about two years on wholesale and balancing revenue before the contract period begins.
How long can the BME Jawor battery discharge for?It is rated at 28.27 MW with 120 MWh of energy capacity, which is roughly 4.2 hours at full output. That is slightly above the four-hour median Enerdatics finds among Polish battery transactions since 2024 that state an energy capacity.
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