It's Friday. Restarting a dark grid usually means a hydro plant or diesel generator spins up first. In Cambodia, a battery went first and the hydro plant followed.
In today's edition:
🔋 Big Story: A grid-forming battery black-start in Cambodia
⚡ Quick Hits: CFS's tape order, PJM's 169 GW queue, Germany's battery rules, Siemens turbines for Dynamis, a gas utility's geothermal loops
💰 Capital: CTR's $205M debt-to-equity swap
📋 Policy Watch: the Senate permitting bill, California's VPP laws, South Korea's grid access
📊 Chart of the Day: Europe's underused inverter factories
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The Big Story
Sungrow's grid-forming battery passes black-start tests in Cambodia
Sungrow has completed grid connection and acceptance testing of a 108.4 MW/215.6 MWh grid-forming battery at Electricité du Cambodge's Kandal Stueng substation in Kandal Province, Energy-Storage.news reported. According to Sungrow, the system's 516 grid-forming power conversion units energized the plant from zero voltage, then helped restore about 240 km of transmission lines and five substations. Grid-forming units set their own voltage and frequency instead of following the grid's.
"When a power system faces disturbances or loses normal grid support, grid-forming technology can help establish and maintain stable voltage"
The restored section started and synchronized the 60 MW Kamchay hydropower plant, then ran alongside the 135 MW CIIDG coal plant and connected loads, Sungrow said.
The battery ran islanded for 3.5 hours and switched between grid-connected and islanded modes three times, holding voltage within 2% and frequency within 0.15 Hz, per the company.
It rode through five transformer energizations, one rated 100 MVA, and held sync across 15-degree phase-angle gaps.
Source: Energy-Storage.news
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Quick Hits
Technology milestones from across the grid
Five milestones, from fusion magnets to geothermal loops.
Commonwealth Fusion Systems ordered more than 10,000 km of high-temperature superconducting tape from Fujikura for its ARC plants, starting with Fall Line in Chesterfield County, Virginia, an order CFS calls the largest of its kind. Commonwealth Fusion Systems
PJM moved 617 projects totaling nearly 169 GW into the first phase of its reformed interconnection process on Sept. 28, led by 81.1 GW of gas and 50.1 GW of storage. PJM Inside Lines
Germany's Bundesnetzagentur adopted MiSpeL rules that lower levies and grid fees for home, EV and business batteries that charge from the grid and feed power back, though automakers and utilities say the rules are still too complicated. Clean Energy Wire
Siemens Energy signed to supply 119 SGT-400 turbine cores, about 1.7 GW in total, for Dynamis' "hypermobile" DT18 power packages for data centers and industry, with first deliveries in 2027. Power Engineering
Vermont Gas Systems will pay for and own the ground loops of a geothermal network serving 36 affordable homes at Riggs Meadow in Hinesburg, with residents paying a monthly fee and drilling set for early 2027. Electrek
The Capital Stack
Controlled Thermal Resources swaps $205M of debt for equity before a SPAC
Controlled Thermal Resources, the Stellantis-backed geothermal and lithium developer, is converting $205 million of debt into equity ahead of a planned Nasdaq listing via a blank-check company later this year, Heatmap reported. Stellantis is among the investors taking a stake, per Heatmap's source. CTR aims to bring a 150 MW Salton Sea geothermal plant online in 2028, and CEO Rod Colwell said its critical-minerals stage will be commissioned in 2030.
Source: Heatmap
Also in the capital stack:
The US and South Korea outlined a $120 billion "Project Power" framework for six AP1000 and two APR1400 reactors, with a $10 billion advance payment for long-lead items targeted by year-end. Sites are not yet specified. World Nuclear News
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Policy Watch
The Senate's Bipartisan American Affordability and Jobs Act, introduced Sept. 30 by Sens. Whitehouse, Heinrich, Lee and Capito, would let FERC permit transmission lines, scrap the federal right of first refusal, and assign transmission costs fully to computational loads. Amendments wait until November. Utility Dive
California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed SB 913, directing the CPUC and CAISO to measure and reward the grid value of home batteries, EVs and thermostats, and SB 905, requiring utilities to report grid utilization data that could show where virtual power plants beat upgrades on cost. Canary Media
South Korea's energy ministry will let renewables connect beyond hosting limits on curtailable terms, projecting transmission hosting capacity rising from 119 GW to 171 GW by 2030. pv magazine
Chart of the Day
Europe's inverter factories head for 57% utilization
European inverter manufacturing capacity is forecast to double from 60 GW in 2021 to more than 120 GW by 2027, while factory utilization falls from 83% in 2023 to 57%, PV Tech Research projects.
Source: PV Tech · October 1, 2026
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