Atılay Koyaş, Business Development and Sales Director BESS at YEO, brought to the “Energy Transition – Bucharest 2025” conference, organized by Energynomics, the perspective of a company that spans the full spectrum of renewable energy activities — from EPC and grid infrastructure to battery manufacturing and system integration. His intervention underlined the strategic role of energy storage as the “balancing muscle” of modern power systems and as a foundation for digital, AI-driven economies.
Founded over two decades ago, YEO is a Turkish EPC company with extensive experience in solar, wind, and high-voltage infrastructure projects. “We have now entered into BESS production as well,” Koyaş announced. The company has completed construction of its first battery factory in Istanbul, which will become operational in two months. With a production capacity of 5 GWh per year, the facility will deliver both utility-scale containerized systems and C&I-scale cabinet solutions, while R&D work continues for residential storage.
Explaining why batteries have emerged as the most effective form of energy storage, Koyaş reminded the audience that even traditional grids required balancing between supply and demand. “With renewables, the grid became bidirectional. We needed storage to stabilize it,” he said. Among all technologies available, batteries stand out as “the most economical, the fastest in response, and the most flexible,” deployable at generation, transmission, or distribution levels.
For YEO, this integration challenge goes beyond hardware. “It is important to have tier-one technology, but equally important to integrate it properly into the grid, with a strong EMS, SCADA, and automation architecture,” Koyaş emphasized. The company’s dual role as both EPC and manufacturer enables it to deliver optimized, project-specific solutions, a capability now being tested in several major undertakings — including a 500 MWh standalone BESS project in Azerbaijan connected at 400 kV, designed to help stabilize the country’s fast-growing renewable system.
In Romania, YEO is developing a 900 MW project portfolio, half of which is under execution. The company is also installing a 10 MWh storage system in its own solar plants to directly contribute to grid balancing. “Each project must be designed according to its actual needs,” Koyaş noted. “Sometimes it’s about peak shaving or load shifting; in other cases, it’s about frequency services or hybrid integration with renewables.”
Reflecting on lessons learned as an EPC contractor, Koyaş warned against treating battery projects as generic equipment purchases. “We often receive standard RFQs where the optimization of capacity, degradation over time, or PCS functionality are overlooked,” he said. YEO’s approach is to engage early with investors, calibrating the system design to long-term performance requirements and grid parameters.
Looking ahead, Koyaş connected the rapid rise in storage demand to broader technological trends. “In the U.S., companies already speak in gigawatt-hours because AI and data centers need stable and continuous power,” he observed. “The same logic applies globally: as digitalization expands, large-scale energy storage becomes indispensable.”
With its new manufacturing base, EPC experience, and regional project pipeline, YEO positions itself not only as a technology supplier but as an active enabler of the transition to a resilient, renewable, and data-driven energy system — one where batteries play the central role in keeping the lights, and the algorithms, running.
The “Energy Transition – Bucharest 2025” conference was organized by Energynomics, with the support of the Italian Chamber of Commerce in Romania, together with and our partners: Elektra Renewable Support, Alive Capital, Elgeka Ferfelis Romania, Finacon, Geocart, GoodWe, Imsol, PayPoint, Photomate, PPC Renewables, Prime Sales & Services, Prysmian, Modvin, RENOMIA | Gallagher, Solar Today, Solar Turbines, Sigenergy, ThinkBlu Solution, Unicredit, Vard, Webus 4 Energy by Softenerg, WeCo Batteries, YEO.