Engie’s 320MWh Drogenbos battery in Belgium shows how grid-scale storage, AI-enabled optimisation and smart market design are quietly powering Europe’s green transition.
Most companies talk about decarbonisation; a smaller group quietly builds the hardware that makes it possible. Engie’s new 80MW/320MWh battery project at Drogenbos, just outside Brussels, sits firmly in that second group.
This matters because large battery energy storage systems (BESS) are now doing the heavy lifting in Europe’s energy transition. Belgium is phasing out nuclear, adding more wind and solar, and trying to keep winter lights on without firing up more fossil plants. That’s a hard engineering and market-design problem – not a branding exercise.
Engie hiring its former subsidiary NHOA Energy to deliver the Drogenbos system is more than a simple project win. It’s a snapshot of how green technology, sophisticated market incentives and AI-enabled optimisation are coming together to make clean power reliable and profitable.
In this article, I’ll unpack what Engie is building in Belgium, why this specific 320MWh project matters, and what it tells you if you’re investing in, developing, or operating large-scale green technology assets.
What Engie Is Actually Building in Belgium
Engie is assembling one of Europe’s more interesting national battery portfolios in Belgium: three grid-scale sites totalling 380MW / 1.5GWh of storage.
The Drogenbos project is the latest piece:
- Drogenbos – 80MW / 320MWh, near Brussels
- Vilvoorde – 200MW / 800MWh, first phase operational, second phase due in early 2026
- Kallo – 100MW / 400MWh, under construction at the Port of Antwerp-Bruges
Together, these plants form a flexible, dispatchable layer under Belgium’s growing renewable fleet. They’re designed to:
- Provide frequency regulation and voltage support
- Trade electricity across markets via energy arbitrage
- Support cross-border balancing with neighbouring countries
- Backstop winter supply security as nuclear capacity phases out
Drogenbos will be built around 88 NHEXUS battery containers from NHOA Energy, a company that used to be Engie EPS (Engie’s own storage arm) before being sold to Taiwan Cement Corporation in 2021. Engie is now buying technology from a former subsidiary – which tells you something: what matters most today is best-in-class project execution and platform capability, not simply owning everything in-house.
Construction starts in March 2026, with commercial operations targeted for November 2027, under a 15-year Capacity Remuneration Mechanism (CRM) contract.
Why a 320MWh Battery Matters for Belgium’s Energy Security
The core role of the Drogenbos BESS is simple: keep the grid stable while fossil and nuclear generation ramp down and renewables ramp up.
Belgium’s Capacity Remuneration Mechanism pays assets like batteries to be reliably available during stress periods, especially winter peaks. This isn’t a subsidy for “nice-to-have” green tech; it’s a structured market product that pays for capacity and flexibility.
Here’s what that looks like in practice:
- Stable winter supply – When demand spikes and wind output drops, batteries can respond in milliseconds, buying time before slower assets or imports ramp up.
- Less dependence on thermal peakers – Instead of building or running more gas peaker plants, Belgium can lean on batteries to handle short, sharp peaks.
- Smoother nuclear phase-out – As nuclear capacity exits, batteries help maintain reliability standards and avoid blackouts.
The Drogenbos site is strategically located near Brussels, where major transmission lines interconnect with neighbouring markets. That positioning allows the BESS to support cross-border balancing. In practice, that means the system can:
- Absorb excess cheap power from neighbouring countries when it’s windy or sunny there
- Export power back into regional markets during shortages or price spikes
For a relatively small country like Belgium, this cross-border flexibility is a big deal. It turns batteries from local assets into regional balancing tools, which is where a lot of future storage value will come from.
NHOA’s NHEXUS Platform: Where Green Technology Meets Smart Control
Under the hood, Drogenbos is more than a shipping yard full of containers. The NHEXUS platform from NHOA is a good example of how advanced control systems and AI-style optimisation are now essential to battery economics.
Core capabilities that matter
NHEXUS brings a few features that are increasingly non-negotiable for utility-scale storage:
- Battery management system (BMS) tuned for long life and high utilisation
- Grid-forming capabilities, so the BESS can support weak grids, not just follow them
- Utility-scale control software that can orchestrate dozens of containers as a single asset
- Integration pathways for AI-driven forecasting and optimisation
From a green technology perspective, this is where the magic happens:
- Forecasting – Software predicts renewable output, demand patterns and market prices.
- Optimisation – Algorithms choose when to charge, when to discharge, and which services to prioritise (CRM capacity obligations, frequency response, or arbitrage).
- Degradation management – Control logic balances profit today with battery health tomorrow.
You can call this “AI” or just “smart optimisation,” but either way, it’s software-first engineering. A 320MWh battery without good control software is just a cost centre. With it, you’ve got a multi-revenue-stack asset that pays for itself faster and supports the grid more effectively.
How Storage Fits the Bigger Green Technology Picture
Here’s the thing about large-scale batteries: they’re not an optional add-on to solar and wind. They’re the infrastructure that makes high-renewable systems work without constant fossil backup.
Belgium is a good case study for three reasons:
- Concentrated risk – A small, dense country with industrial loads, high electrification needs, and limited space for new generation.
- Fast renewable penetration – Offshore wind in the North Sea, growing solar capacity, and a long-term nuclear phase-out.
- EU climate pressure – Belgium doesn’t operate in a vacuum; it’s tied into EU targets and cross-border grid operations.
Engie’s 1.5GWh of storage in Belgium does a few important things for the wider green technology ecosystem:
- Enables more renewables – The more storage you have, the more intermittent capacity you can add without breaking system stability.
- Decarbonises flexibility – Instead of firing up gas plants for short-term balancing, batteries provide emissions-free flexibility.
- Makes electrification credible – As buildings, transport and industry electrify, you need a grid that can handle sudden shifts in demand. Storage underpins that.
From a business perspective, these projects show where serious capital is now flowing: into real assets that combine hardware, software, and long-term contracted revenue. In a noisy green technology market, that’s where I’d pay the most attention.
Lessons for Developers, Investors and System Operators
If you’re working on green technology projects, there are a few clear lessons in the Drogenbos deal and Engie’s wider Belgian portfolio.
1. Capacity markets are now core to storage business models
Belgium’s CRM is doing exactly what it was designed to do: pull flexible capacity into the system before reliability becomes a crisis. The 15-year contract at Drogenbos gives Engie predictable cash flow, which:
- De-risks investment and lowers financing costs
- Supports additional merchant upside from arbitrage and ancillary services
- Makes multi-hundred-MWh projects bankable at scale
If you’re a developer in another market, this is the playbook: pair long-term capacity contracts with optimised, merchant-exposed operations. Smart software then earns upside on top of a secure floor.
2. Technology partnerships beat going it alone
Engie could have tried to keep everything internal, but instead:
- NHOA provides the technology platform and containers
- Tractebel, Engie’s engineering arm, provides technical support and design
- Engie orchestrates the market strategy, operations and portfolio optimisation
Most companies get this wrong. They either outsource everything and lose the learning, or try to over-verticalise and move too slowly. The Drogenbos–Vilvoorde–Kallo trio shows a more balanced approach that actually scales.
3. AI-enabled optimisation is no longer optional
For assets this size, “set and forget” doesn’t work. To stay profitable over a 15-year life, operators increasingly rely on:
- Machine-learning price prediction for day-ahead and intraday markets
- Dynamic service allocation between capacity commitments, reserves, and spot trading
- Automated dispatch that reacts to grid frequency and price changes within seconds
The result is higher utilisation, better returns, and batteries that genuinely support decarbonisation instead of sitting idle.
Where This Fits in the Green Technology Transition
This blog is part of a broader look at how green technology is moving from concept decks to concrete, steel and silicon. Drogenbos isn’t a flashy consumer gadget. It’s industrial infrastructure that quietly changes what’s possible for clean energy.
Here’s the bigger picture:
- AI and advanced controls are turning batteries into programmable power plants.
- Grid-scale storage portfolios like Engie’s are becoming central to national energy strategies, not side projects.
- Policy frameworks like Belgium’s CRM are proving that you can design markets that reward flexibility and reliability while pushing fossil fuels off the system.
If you’re building or backing green technology, this is the pattern to look for: hardware you can touch, software you can iterate, and policy mechanisms that pay for reliability and flexibility.
The reality? The transition isn’t being driven by slogans. It’s being built one carefully engineered, well-optimised asset at a time – and 320MWh in Drogenbos is one of those assets.
If you’re considering your own role in this space – as an investor, utility, or technology provider – ask a blunt question: How many of my projects are actually helping the grid take more renewables while staying reliable? The closer your answer looks to Engie’s Belgian portfolio, the better positioned you’ll be in the next decade of green technology.