Why Nofar USA's $40M Ormat Battery Deal Shows Stage, Not Scale, Now Prices US Storage

Nofar USA has transacted on a ready-to-build battery energy storage project of roughly 100 MW / 400 MWh in the United States, and Enerdatics records the seller as Ormat Technologies and the consideration as $40 million. The project sits on brownfield land, holds site plan approval and an executed grid interconnection agreement, and is in the process of signing a 15-year offtake agreement. Construction is expected to begin within twelve months, with commercial operation planned by the end of 2028. Allon Raveh, chairman and CEO of Nofar USA, put the total project cost at about $230 million. The price says far less about the megawatts than about the stage.

How much did Nofar USA pay for the Ormat battery project?

Nofar USA paid $40 million for approximately 100 MW / 400 MWh, which works out at $0.40 million per MW of consideration. Set against the roughly $230 million Raveh expects the project to cost in total, the acquisition accounts for about 17 percent of the capital the asset will absorb before it reaches commercial operation. That proportion is the whole point. A buyer taking a four-hour system with an executed interconnection agreement, site plan approval and a brownfield site is not paying for steel or cells, both of which it still has to fund. It is paying for the queue position and the permits, and for the certainty that construction can start inside a year rather than at the end of an interconnection study cycle that now routinely outlasts the build itself.

What does ready-to-build mean in US battery storage?

Ready-to-build describes a project that has cleared every pre-construction gate: site control, local and environmental permits, and, critically, an executed interconnection agreement fixing the terms and cost of connecting to the grid. What remains is procurement and construction, which are capital-intensive but broadly schedule-certain. The distinction carries commercial weight because the risks that kill US battery projects are concentrated before this line. Interconnection queues in most markets take years and can return network upgrade costs large enough to make a project uneconomic, local permitting for storage has grown more contested, and neither risk prices cleanly in advance. A ready-to-build asset has retired all of it. Brownfield siting, as here, typically eases both the permitting path and local objection.

Why is Ormat Technologies selling a battery project?

Ormat is selling because development, not ownership, is where the return on this particular asset sits. The company is a geothermal and storage operator whose US battery fleet was built largely around short-duration merchant ancillary services, and Enerdatics' records show this is the first battery divestment Ormat has made. Its only three previously recorded disposals were geothermal, all operational, and all completed between 2017 and 2019. Selling a consented, interconnected project at ready-to-build converts development effort into cash without committing the roughly $230 million of construction capital the asset still needs, and without adding a four-hour, offtake-contracted profile to a fleet shaped around a different revenue model. Recycling one project to fund several is the more efficient use of the balance sheet.

Enerdatics' data shows that stage, not scale, is what US battery buyers are now paying for. Nofar itself supplies the cleanest illustration. In March 2025 it bought a 350 MW US battery development pipeline from Q CELLS for $10 million, or roughly $0.03 million per MW of consideration. Sixteen months later it paid $0.40 million per MW for a project less than a third the size, the difference being that this one is ready to build. That is a fourteenfold gap in price per MW from the same buyer in the same market, driven entirely by how far each asset had travelled. Across the wider market, Enerdatics puts the median developer premium on US ready-to-build standalone battery deals at $0.07 million per MW, within an interquartile range of $0.06 million to $0.07 million, across thirteen transactions worth $467.9 million since the start of 2023.

What does the deal signal for the US storage market?

The deal signals that the scarce asset in US storage is a connected queue position, and that the sell side is starting to supply it. Enerdatics has recorded 83 standalone US battery transactions since the start of 2023: 22 in 2023, 23 in 2024, 18 in 2025 and 20 already in 2026 with five months of the year still to run, which puts 2026 on course to be the most active year yet. The buyer field is deep and well capitalised, spanning Brookfield, CBRE Investment Management, Gridstor, Daiwa Energy & Infrastructure, Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners, Captona and Palisade Investment Partners across 61 deals since the start of 2024. Developers who can carry a battery through interconnection and permitting will keep being paid a step change at the handover point, and Ormat's first storage disposal suggests operators with development capability and competing calls on capital are beginning to answer.

For Nofar, the transaction continues an unusually fast build-out. Enerdatics records five US acquisitions by the company, four of them since March 2025, covering 2,429 MW and $716 million of disclosed consideration, including the 979 MW Pine Gate Renewables solar portfolio bought for $575 million in December 2025 and a 1 GW development-stage solar position taken that September. The Tel Aviv-listed parent carries a market capitalisation of around $3 billion, and the US platform is being assembled across both solar generation and storage rather than around a single technology. A ready-to-build battery with a 15-year offtake in negotiation fits a portfolio that needs contracted cash flow sitting alongside its merchant and development exposure.

Key takeaways

• Nofar USA transacted on a roughly 100 MW / 400 MWh ready-to-build battery project, which Enerdatics records as a $40 million purchase from Ormat Technologies, with commercial operation planned for the end of 2028.
• The consideration equals about $0.40 million per MW, roughly 17 percent of the approximately $230 million total project cost cited by Nofar USA chairman and CEO Allon Raveh.
• The project sits on brownfield land with site plan approval and an executed grid interconnection agreement, and a 15-year offtake agreement is in the process of being signed.
• Enerdatics data shows Nofar paid fourteen times more per MW here than for the 350 MW Q CELLS US battery pipeline it acquired for $10 million in March 2025, isolating stage as the driver of value.
• Enerdatics has recorded 83 standalone US battery transactions since 2023, with 20 already logged in 2026, and this is the first battery divestment on Ormat's record.

Frequently asked questions

How much did Nofar USA pay for the Ormat battery project?Enerdatics records the consideration at $40 million for approximately 100 MW / 400 MWh, which implies about $0.40 million per MW. Nofar USA has separately put the project's total cost at around $230 million, so the acquisition represents roughly 17 percent of the capital the asset will require before commercial operation.

What does ready-to-build mean for a battery storage project?Ready-to-build means every pre-construction gate has been cleared: site control, permits and an executed grid interconnection agreement. Only procurement and construction remain. Because interconnection and permitting carry the risks most likely to kill a US battery project, reaching this stage removes the bulk of development risk and commands a marked step up in price per MW.

Is this Ormat Technologies' first battery sale?Yes, on Enerdatics' records this is Ormat's first battery divestment. The company's three previously recorded disposals were all geothermal and all operational, completed between 2017 and 2019.

Ready to get deal-ready answers in seconds? Try Enerdatics Leap AI and access verified intelligence across M&A, financings, PPAs, projects, and energy market developments through natural language.