Leader Energy Begins 400MWh Battery Storage Build in Malaysia

A groundbreaking that moves Malaysia's storage plans off paper

Leader Energy Group Berhad has started building a grid-scale battery energy storage system (BESS) rated at 100MW/400MWh in Pajam, Negeri Sembilan. It is one of the projects in Malaysia's first competitive tender for utility-scale storage.12 Reporting from Petaling Jaya describes the ceremony as the project's official move into construction and part of the group's wider push into grid-scale storage.2 The asset is being developed through the subsidiary Leader Energy Storage Sdn Bhd and is due to be commissioned in 2027.17

On its own, 100MW is modest by global standards. What makes the Pajam project worth watching is the institutional change behind it. Malaysia is starting to procure flexibility through tenders in the same way it procures generation, and this is one of the first such contracts where construction has visibly begun.

What the project is meant to do

The coverage gives the same purpose in nearly identical terms. The facility will make Peninsular Malaysia's grid more flexible, help it absorb more renewable power, and smooth out swings between supply and demand.349 Malay-language coverage quotes the company describing a system that stores electricity and releases it when needed.10

The ratings show the project's role. A 100MW/400MWh system can discharge at full power for about four hours. That is the length needed to move midday solar output into the evening peak, which matches the stated goals better than very short-burst frequency services would. The Blueleaf Energy–Universal Peak consortium, another MyBeST winner, puts it plainly: the programme's batteries are meant to provide frequency regulation and peak and energy shifting, and to make solar useful after sunset.11

Group CEO Dato' Sean H'ng summed up the case in one line. A grid with more renewables needs more flexibility over when power is available and when it is used, and storage provides it.37 He also presented Pajam as the next stage after the company's earlier pilot.5

The MyBeST programme in context

MyBeST is run by the Energy Commission (Suruhanjaya Tenaga) and consists of four grid-connected projects of 100MW/400MWh each, or 400MW/1,600MWh in total.13 Its stated aims are to reduce reliance on fossil-fuel peaking plants, lower system costs over time, and support the National Energy Transition Roadmap target of 70% renewable capacity by 2050.415

The tender was competitive. Four bids were selected from 28 submissions.11 The commission announced the shortlist on 19 December 2025, a little over a year after the solicitation opened in November 2024.12

The timeline has slipped, and this gets less attention in the latest coverage than it should. When the request for qualification opened in late 2024, each project was expected to be fully operating in 2026.17 As recently as December 2025, the programme was still described as targeting commercial operation in 2026.19 Every report on the Pajam groundbreaking now gives 2027.137 A one-year slip is not unusual for a first-of-its-kind procurement. Still, the tender's original schedule and its delivery schedule no longer match, and Pajam has to hit its new date if the programme is to keep its credibility.

Other milestones show the programme moving forward. In June 2026 the Blueleaf–Universal Peak vehicle, BKHM BESS, signed a BESS Service Agreement and a Connection Agreement with Tenaga Nasional Berhad (TNB). The service agreement works much like a power purchase agreement with TNB's Single Buyer, covering capacity, availability and performance obligations.20 The Leader Energy coverage does not say whether it has signed equivalent agreements. Given that it has moved to construction, it most likely has, but this is an inference.

The technology question: what's in the box

The Pajam reporting does not say which battery chemistry or supplier Leader Energy will use. This is the biggest gap in the coverage, especially from a battery-technology angle. The Energy Commission has said that each of the four winning bidders proposed a different technology supplier. It chose that spread deliberately, so it can compare how different BESS configurations perform on Peninsular Malaysia's grid and in its climate.1211 That makes MyBeST a field trial as well as a procurement, and Pajam is one of the four test cases.

Leader Energy's own history with batteries is unusual. Its experience comes from a 1.45MWh sodium-sulfur (NAS) pilot at the Leader Solar Energy II plant in Bukit Selambau, Kedah, paired with a 20MWac solar farm to capture surplus solar output and release it later.17 The pilot won the Renewable Energy Enabler Technology award at the Malaysia National Energy Awards 2025 and was a finalist at the Enlit Asia Power & Energy Awards 2026.110

Sodium-sulfur is a high-temperature chemistry. It sits outside the lithium supply chain that dominates both EV and stationary batteries. The wider Malaysian market is mostly going a different way. Executives entering the sector say lithium iron phosphate (LFP), the chemistry that has also spread through EV batteries, is gaining ground because of its safety, durability and cost, and is now expanding into Southeast Asia.18 One new entrant, PUC Bhd, plans to buy a firm with a Hithium partnership to set up a local BESS assembly line that could reach 2.0GWh a year if completed.18

Whether Pajam carries the NAS experience forward or uses mainstream LFP will show a lot about how the company thinks about technology risk. The available reporting does not settle that.

Carbon capture is not part of this story, and readers looking for that angle should not expect it. A legal analysis of the first MyBeST tender described BESS as one of the "unproven markets" named in the national roadmap. It suggested that if the programme succeeds, the government might move on to other unproven areas such as carbon capture, utilisation and storage, green hydrogen and sustainable aviation fuel.17 In that reading, the decarbonisation link is indirect. Batteries cut emissions by displacing gas-fired peaking plants, and MyBeST's early performance may shape how quickly Malaysia procures other new low-carbon technologies.

Safety and end-of-life rules

A policy detail rarely mentioned in groundbreaking coverage is what happens to these systems after they are switched on and at the end of their lives. Late in 2025, the deputy energy transition minister told Parliament that BESS installations must meet the NFPA 855 fire standard and international standards including IEC 62619 and UL 9540. He added that EPC contractors must set out procedures for decommissioning, disposal and recycling, and that recycling of battery components is mandatory.13 These rules will matter more as gigawatt-hours of batteries spread across the peninsula.

A crowded and accelerating market

Pajam is one project among several. In July 2026 TNB inaugurated a 100MW/400MWh grid-forming BESS in Dungun, Terengganu.16 In December 2025, a project of the same size at Lahad Datu in Sabah was described as the largest by output in Southeast Asia. Sungrow's storage arm supplied the equipment, and it was delivered in just over a year.19

The pipeline is getting larger. The sixth Large-Scale Solar round (LSS6) seeks 2.5GW of solar paired with 1.25GW of battery capacity, with commercial operation due by end-2029.16 Officials had said in late 2025 that the next LSS round would require batteries.13 In a July 2026 report, Hong Leong Investment Bank called storage the next growth phase for Malaysia's renewable construction sector and a billion-ringgit opportunity. Industry figures say the grid's renewable penetration of nearly 32% makes storage unavoidable from here.18

My reading: MyBeST's 1,600MWh will soon look small next to the solar-linked storage that LSS6 will bring. The programme's lasting value will probably come less from the capacity it adds and more from what it shows. That includes the contract template (the BESSA structure), grid-connection standards, safety rules, and real data on which chemistries hold up in tropical heat.

What it means for Leader Energy

All outlets frame the groundbreaking as part of Leader Energy's effort to become an integrated renewable infrastructure platform spanning generation, storage and transmission across Asia.67 The company says it has more than three decades in the power sector.1

The sources do not report contract values, financing terms, EPC partners or the battery supplier for Pajam. Those are the details that will decide whether the company actually earns a return from the shift from pilot to grid-scale. The 2027 commissioning date is the public benchmark. Since the programme has already moved its target once, Pajam's progress will be one of the clearest signs of whether Malaysia's first standalone storage tender delivers.