Firm SCE capacity available today?

7 MW plus 2 MW flexible service

Anduril campus investment?

$1 billion, 1.18 million square feet

Critical Loop Will Bridge a Long Beach Manufacturing Campus With 12 MW and 60 MWh of Batteries on a 7 MW Grid Feed

Industrial & C&I Microgrids Microgrids News
Marin Holt
October 31, 2026
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22
7 minutes read

Temporary power system capacity: 25 MW
Battery storage across six buildings: 12 MW / 60 MWh
Firm SCE capacity available today: 7 MW plus 2 MW flexible service
Bridge term: at least 18 months
Anduril campus investment: $1 billion, 1.18 million square feet

Critical Loop and developer SRG Commercial announced a 25 MW temporary power system on October 27, 2026. It serves a six-building advanced manufacturing campus near Long Beach, California. The Long Beach company will supply 12 MW and 60 MWh of battery storage across the campus. The site has about 7 MW of firm Southern California Edison capacity and 2 MW of flexible service. The system is planned to run for at least 18 months, until the utility finishes its permanent upgrade.

Critical Loop declined to name the tenant. ENR reported that The Information identified it as Anduril Industries, the defense technology manufacturer. In January, the California Governor’s Office of Business and Economic Development said Anduril is investing $1 billion in a 1.18 million square foot campus. The campus spans Long Beach and Lakewood and supports about 5,500 direct jobs on site. Critical Loop told ENR that the first buildings are expected to energize in late February 2027.

Each of the six buildings gets two CLB-5100 battery systems, the product Critical Loop launched with this project. Critical Loop owns, operates and maintains the batteries. SRG’s construction team installs the Cygnus controllers and AC combiners at each building’s utility service. The controller enforces the utility import limit. It charges the batteries when grid capacity is available and discharges them when building demand exceeds it. Another 3.5 MW of emergency generation stays disconnected in normal operation and covers extended outages.

The company said the architecture delivers 25 MW of total capacity within nine months from contract to energization. It said standalone diesel generation carries higher operating costs and price uncertainty. Diesel also lacks the power quality that advanced manufacturing and AI loads need. SCE is bringing two new feeders to the campus. Critical Loop did not disclose the contract value.

The batteries connect under California Electric Rule 21, which governs how customer-owned generation and storage connect to investor-owned utility systems. Critical Loop’s non-export interconnection application is underway. SCE must review the configuration, execute an interconnection agreement and grant permission to operate before the system is energized. The company said Cygnus holds UL 3141 and IEEE 2030.5 certifications and completed interoperability testing with PG&E.

Alongside the project, SRG named Critical Loop its preferred microgrid partner across Southern California for the next two years. The developer calls the approach a Power-Ready Industrial Portfolio model. It pre-solves interconnection constraints across its pipeline before tenants lease the buildings.

Why It Matters

This is a bridge, not a plant. The campus starts with about 7 MW of firm utility service and 2 MW of flexible service. The batteries cycle against that import limit to cover the rest of the demand. That is the flexible-interconnection logic the California Public Utilities Commission has pushed on SCE and PG&E for large loads. The 18-month term shows how long a developer now expects to wait for two new feeders in Los Angeles County.

The open questions are what SCE’s Rule 21 review requires and what happens to the batteries when permanent capacity arrives. A non-export configuration still needs an executed interconnection agreement and permission to operate before the late February 2027 energization date. Critical Loop keeps ownership of the assets. The systems move to the next SRG site under the two-year agreement.

Critical Perspective

Critical Loop would not confirm the tenant, so the Anduril link rests on a report in The Information that ENR relayed. The 25 MW headline figure bundles 7 MW of firm service, 2 MW of flexible service, 12 MW of batteries and 3.5 MW of generators reserved for outages. The firm supply during a long production shift is still what SCE delivers plus whatever the 60 MWh held at the start of the day, and recharging runs over the same 7 MW feed at night. The non-export Rule 21 application is not approved, and the late February 2027 energization date sits on that approval. Neither company disclosed the contract value or who absorbs the cost if the two SCE feeders slip past the 18-month plan. What does the campus run on in month nineteen if the feeders are not there?