What a feasibility study answers
A battery that looks attractive on paper can disappoint in practice because of grid limits, the wrong sizing or an over-optimistic revenue model. A good study therefore answers five questions, in this order:
- Grid: is there room on the connection and in the supply area, and on what terms?
- Technology: what power and storage capacity suit the site and its use?
- Dispatch: how will the battery be used, in which markets, and what does that mean for degradation and lifetime?
- Permit and siting: which procedure applies, and what will the municipality ask for?
- Risks: what happens if prices, grid terms or costs turn out differently than assumed?
The grid: room, waiting list and conditions
The grid decides first whether a project can go ahead. The capacity map of Netbeheer Nederland shows one of four statuses per area, for offtake and feed-in separately: capacity available without a queue, limited capacity without a queue, area under investigation with a queue, or shortage with a queue. A study starts there.
It then looks at the connection itself. If you already have a connection with unused capacity, for example at a wind or solar park, a battery can use that space without raising the contracted capacity. If a new or heavier connection is needed in a full region, the request joins the waiting list, which can run to 10 years according to Netbeheer Nederland.
The grid operator's conditions also belong in the study. Enexis, for example, connects batteries above 1 MW only in a congestion-neutral way, with a capacity control contract under which power can be limited the day before expected congestion. For flexible users, the regulator ACM introduced alternative transport rights in 2024, with a lower grid tariff. Such a condition or contract type changes the revenue model, so it must be in the study.
If the battery and the park share the connection, the legal form belongs in it too. Since 1 January 2026 the Energiewet allows cable pooling with storage: at most four installations, a connection of at least 100 kVA, and a notification to the ACM.
Technology: power and storage duration
A battery has two measures. Power in megawatts (MW) says how much electricity it can take in or deliver at one moment. Storage capacity in megawatt-hours (MWh) says how much energy fits in, and so how long it can run at full power. A battery with more hours of storage can shift more, but it is also larger and more expensive.
The right ratio depends on the connection and on the market in which the battery will operate. If the power does not fit within what the connection allows, a bigger battery makes no sense. The study therefore sets power, storage duration and connection side by side.
Safety and siting are part of the technology too. For lithium batteries, PGS 37-1 is the national guideline. The study assumes a design that meets it, with enough distance from homes and access for the fire brigade.
Dispatch: how the battery earns
A battery can work in several markets: the day-ahead market (buying power when it is cheap and selling when it is expensive), the imbalance market and TenneT's ancillary services such as FCR and aFRR. The day-ahead price has been set per quarter-hour since 1 October 2025, so the study calculates per quarter-hour.
Prices below zero are part of this. By our own sum of RVO's overview, there were over 580 hours with a negative price in 2025. A battery can then charge at a low or negative price, but the number of hours differs from year to year. In the first nine months of 2026 there were about 390. A study should therefore show several scenarios, not a single year.
Dispatch also determines wear. The more often a battery charges and discharges fully, the faster it ages. A good study weighs the extra income from more cycles against a shorter lifetime.
Permit and siting
A battery usually needs an environmental permit. In the regular procedure the municipality decides within 8 weeks, which can be extended once by 6 weeks. In the extended procedure it is 6 months. Municipalities also have their own policies: some ask for a noise report, a landscape integration plan and a PGS 37-1 checklist, and designate preferred locations, such as at wind turbines or within a solar park.
The study sets out which procedure applies to your site, which documents are needed and what the timeline is. A permit that arrives a year later than expected changes the business case.
The risks
A study that shows only the good side is not a study. It shows what happens if things turn out worse:
- Market prices that come in lower, or a market that saturates as more batteries are added.
- Grid terms that change, such as a capacity limit at busy moments.
- A permit that takes longer or gets extra requirements.
- Costs that rise, or a battery that ages faster than expected.
- Rule changes, such as the national anchoring of PGS 37-1 that IPLO expects in the course of 2028.
Common mistakes
We often see the same assumptions making a business case look too good:
- Adding up revenues from every market at once, although each megawatt can only be sold once.
- Ignoring availability, missed bids and the installation's own consumption.
- Leaving grid charges and grid operator restrictions out of the model.
- Extrapolating a short measurement period to a full year.
- Assuming a connection that does not exist yet, without counting the waiting list.
How we work
We model batteries in our own platform, Powerplaats, with current market prices for day-ahead, imbalance, aFRR and FCR. The grid situation per supply area and the permits in the area are in the same platform.
We compare our models with metered data from batteries in operation in the Netherlands. That shows us where a model is too optimistic, and we correct for it.
You receive a short report with clear advice: go ahead, adjust or stop. With the figures, the sources and the next step. For a first impression you can ask for a free site check.