Ore Energy Signs 1 GWh Iron-Air Storage Deal for Europe Amid €8.9 Billion Annual Curtailment Bill
Ore Energy's iron-air deployment commitment, starting with 400 MWh for 2028 delivery, targets a curtailment problem that cost European grids an estimated €8.9 billion in 2024.
Ore Energy has agreed to deploy 1 gigawatt-hour of iron-air long-duration energy storage across a European portfolio, beginning with a 400 MWh first phase targeted for 2028 delivery, the company confirmed in late June (2026-06-22). The agreement with Dutch energy supplier Budget Thuis represents one of the larger iron-air commitments made in Europe by a technology still working through early commercialisation.1,3
The curtailment arithmetic underpins the commercial rationale. Aurora Energy Research calculated that about 72 TWh of mostly renewable electricity was wasted across Europe in 2024 due to grid bottlenecks, at a cost of roughly €8.9 billion — money paid for generation that never reached a consumer. The European Commission's Joint Research Centre projects annual curtailment could reach 310 TWh by 2040 without sufficient grid investment, equivalent to roughly half the EU's entire 2022 wind and solar output.1
Iron-air storage addresses a specific part of that mismatch. Ore Energy's systems can hold electricity for between 24 and 100 hours using only iron, water and air, with no lithium or cobalt. Co-founder and chief executive Aytaç Yilmaz said in late June (2026-06-30) that European grids are already "wasting electricity that costs billions."3
Budget Thuis CEO Annemarie Buitelaar framed the investment similarly. "Multi-day storage gives us a way to store clean electricity when it is abundant and deliver it when it is most valuable," she said, describing iron-air as especially suited to long-duration applications that conventional short-cycle battery systems are not built to handle. The 1 GWh commitment covers Budget Thuis's European portfolio, starting with the 400 MWh first phase.1
The agreement follows two prior grid-connected deployments of Ore Energy's technology, suggesting the firm has cleared the earliest validation hurdles. Yet scaling to gigawatt-hour capacity across European grid connections is a materially different undertaking, and the 2028 delivery date leaves two years of execution risk on the table.1,3
The German grid sits near the centre of the curtailment problem Ore Energy is targeting. TU Berlin's scenario analysis using the PyPSA-Eur modelling framework found that a zero-carbon German power system optimised with iron-air LDES at scale could require around 32% less wind and solar capacity — a result that would alter how German grid operators approach capacity planning if it holds at commercial deployment.1
The broader European storage market is moving fast. The European battery storage market installed 36 GWh of new capacity in 2025, up 48% from 2024 when growth had slowed, according to SolarPower Europe. Annual additions are expected to exceed 50 GWh in 2026 and could reach 138 GWh per year by 2030 — nearly a fourfold increase over current levels.2
But the EU's own targets sit above that growth path. SolarPower Europe estimates Europe needs 600 GWh of cumulative battery capacity by 2030 to meet energy security and decarbonisation objectives. Current trajectories imply 470 GWh by that date, a shortfall of 130 GWh. Long-duration storage, where iron-air's technical case is strongest given lithium-ion's discharge ceiling of around four hours, competes directly for that gap.2
Ore Energy's 1 GWh deal is a small slice of an ambitious buildout. The 2028 delivery window will arrive as European annual BESS additions are, by most projections, accelerating sharply — meaning iron-air will face its first real commercial test at exactly the point when short-duration LFP competition is also most intense. The technology's duration advantage is established. Its cost per megawatt-hour at the scale European grids actually need has yet to be demonstrated.1,3,2