The grid connection is the asset: Bulgaria stacks batteries, NSW rations access, insurers worry

Serguey Asael Shinder04 October 2026, 12:512 min read

Four energy stories from this week, on three continents, are really about one asset: the right to put power into the grid at a given point.

Bulgaria builds around it. The Tenevo complex in south-eastern Bulgaria started with 242 MWp of solar and then added batteries in three phases, to 311 MW / 772.5 MWh, with 250 MW of wind planned on top. Its owners describe the strategy in exactly those terms: get the most value from the connections they already hold. Bulgaria now has about 5.4 GW of batteries, 22.8% of its installed capacity, the highest share of any country according to the report.

New South Wales rations it. The Bullawah wind farm won planning approval for 804 MW of wind and a 358 MW / 718 MWh battery, but its developer holds transmission access for only about 262 MW. The battery was also cut from four hours to two compared with the first design. The consent is three times larger than the connection, so the project will be built in stages.

Insurers price the concentration. Tokio Marine's TMGX says co-located sites that share an export point now hold hundreds of millions to billions of dollars of insured revenue in one place. A single transformer failure stops all of it at once. The more value developers stack behind one connection, the more the connection itself becomes the risk being underwritten.

Brazil is the exception that shows the rule. Ahead of December's capacity auctions, the storage association Absae calculates from system operator data that about 56 GW of battery connection capacity is available, against its estimate of a 4.5 to 10 GW need, with 296.8 GW of projects registered. Where connection is plentiful, the binding constraint moves to demand, and the auction will be decided on price and on a 10% bonus for favoured substations.

And the US is legislating for it. The Senate permitting bill introduced on 30 September would let FERC permit transmission lines that states have not approved within a year, and would exclude upgrades within existing rights of way from federal environmental review.

What it means

When connection is the scarce input, everything else is sized to it: battery duration in NSW, phased hybrids in Bulgaria, and now insurance terms. That changes what a developer's pipeline is worth. A project with consent but no access right is an option, not an asset, while an existing connection with room behind it is worth more every year. The countries that add connection capacity fastest, as Brazil's numbers suggest, will see the competition move from queues to prices.