Regulatory changes at the national level coupled with policy programmes in leading states will drive residential and commercial energy storage to new heights, according to various sources at this week’s Energy Storage International in California.

The residential sector was particularly well represented in terms of exhibitors at the show, taking place at the same site as Solar Power International in Anaheim between Monday and Thursday this week. As mentioned in our preview blog a few days ago, technology providers including SolarEdge, ElectrIQ and several more including LG Chem and Panasonic Eco Solutions were launching or showcasing products aimed squarely at the US household market.

Behind-the-meter (BTM) energy storage – which includes commercial and industrial (C&I) sectors as well as households – is already growing faster than ever in the US, with figures from Wood Mackenzie Power & Renewables (formerly GTM Research) released at the beginning of September finding that BTM storage constituted 75% of all deployments in megawatts in the second quarter of this year. Analyst Dan Finn-Foley told Energy-Storage.news at the time that he expects BTM could overtake grid-level storage deployments by 2022.

Janice Lin, head of the California Energy Storage Alliance (CESA), told Energy-Storage.news at the show this week that the overall market for energy is growing fast and that interest is also scaling up from outside sources.

“One of the indicators that [energy storage is] really taking on and taking root on a global scale is that we have a lot of proactive enquiries from regulators, decision makers, governments, that are very pro-actively exploring how to incorporate storage into their respective power sector, or their jurisdiction,” Lin said, adding that NGOs and climate groups and advocates including former US vice president Al Gore are also making positive comments or starting initiatives on energy storage.

Key Capture Energy (KCE) and NEC Energy Solutions (NEC) are teaming up on KCE NY 1, a 20 MW battery storage project in Upstate New York’s Saratoga County.

On Wednesday, executives from KCE and NEC, along with a number of local and industry partners, came together to break ground on the project, whose construction has now begun. NEC will provide KCE with a technology solution for project, as well as turnkey engineering, procurement and construction services.

According to the partners, KCE NY 1 will be the largest lithium-ion battery storage project in New York State. It will support Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo’s commitment for New York State to reach 1.5 GW of energy storage by 2025, as well as the state’s Energy Storage Roadmap, which was released in June and developed by the Department of Public Service and New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) with input from numerous stakeholders, including KCE. Additionally, energy storage can help achieve Cuomo’s goal of getting 50% of New York’s electricity from renewable sources by 2030.

“Earlier this year, Governor Cuomo announced the most ambitious energy storage deployment target adopted by any state to date – and today’s announcement is evidence that the market is already responding,” says Alicia Barton, president and CEO of NYSERDA. “I applaud Key Capture and NEC Energy Solutions for advancing this innovative project in New York state and for providing clean energy solutions to benefit communities and residents in Saratoga County.”

KCE has been developing energy storage projects in the Northeast for several years and has a portfolio of projects in various stages of development. For this installation, KCE launched a request for proposals in February.

“After careful review and months of evaluation and discussion, we are pleased to select NEC as a partner for the first project of this size in New York State. NEC brings a stellar team, a top-rated technology solution and a proven commitment to using local labor when possible,” says Jeff Bishop, CEO of KCE. “We are pleased to be moving our headquarters to Albany, N.Y., and are fully committed to support the governor’s vision for an aggressive Clean Energy Standard, as well as job growth in the state of New York.”

Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy is close to completing a pilot project that can turn decommissioned thermal power plants into high-performance storage facilities for renewables.

The facility in Germany can store up to 30 MW – the daily energy requirements of 1500 households – and is set to be commissioned next year.

Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy worked on the project with scientists from the Institute of Thermo-fluid Dynamics at the Technical University of Hamburg and energy supplier Hamburg Energie, which will sell the stored power on the energy markets.

Siemens Gamesa claims its storage facility “reduces the construction and operating costs of larger storage capacities to a fraction of the usual level for battery storage. In commercial use, the technology can store energy at a cost of well below ten euro cents per kilowatt hour.”

Hasan Özdem, head of technology management and projects at Siemens Gamesa, said: “A very interesting option of our technology is to convert decommissioned thermal power plants into high-performance storage facilities for renewable energies at a low cost. With this second-live option, the majority of components such as grid connection, turbines and generators can continue to be used.”

He explained that the simple thermal principle of the storage facility is based on known components which are used in a new combination. For example, fans and heating elements from series production are used to convert the electrical energy into a hot air flow. The same applies to reconversion: a Siemens steam boiler is used as standard in a steam turbine to produce electricity at the end of the storage chain.

The storage unit is connected to an IT platform which Özdem says “guarantees that maximum possible proceeds are achieved by an optimized storage usage”.

The head of the European Association for Storage of Energy (EASE) has acknowledged that the prospects for the technology are good, but regulations must keep pace if the sector is to flourish in the EU.

EASE Secretary General Patrick Clerens said the association was optimistic about the growth of the European energy storage market, with the technology ‘undoubtedly an essential component of a decarbonized energy system.

“However, in order to reach the energy storage capacity that will be needed to fulfil system needs, we need a forward-looking regulatory framework that recognises the unique value and role of energy storage, while allowing for investment security and long term contracts.”

He explained: “In the past, policymakers have been slow to recognize the role and benefits of energy storage for the energy transition. This is likely because energy storage technologies were considered too expensive and perhaps also because they were not so well understood. Now, this is beginning to change. Renewables deployment is increasing, leading to a higher need to carbon-neutral flexibility services.”

Clerens added that experts are predicting continuous cost declines for many storage technologies, so policymakers are beginning to recognize the immense value of energy storage and are looking to build more supportive regulatory frameworks to allow for the market to develop.

“While our activities are focused at the EU Institutions level, we are always looking to countries’ storage policies to learn from missteps and identify best practices. For example, we are closely following developments in the United Kingdom and in Ireland, where policymakers are looking at ways to incentivise flexibility options including storage.”

“For example, system constraints are leading to the development of new ancillary services, such as Enhanced Frequency Response, that can be provided by energy storage devices.”

Long duration energy storage offers “value-add economics” for microgrids and renewables integrations, according to a recent report from Lux Research.

The research and advisory services firm modeled the cost of deploying different technologies for long duration energy storage for five key services: peaker plant replacement, renewables integration, microgrid energy storage systems, renewable energy backup, and seasonal energy storage. The resulting map shows the lowest-cost energy storage technology for each use case.

“Looking at the long duration market in general, we’re starting to see a shift from shorter power based applications which operate on the half hour to hour time frame, towards solutions that offer discharge durations greater than four hours,” Tim Grejtak, energy storage analyst at Lux Research and author of the report, told Microgrid Knowledge

Driven by renewables

The increasing deployment of renewable energy is fueling the demand for energy storage.

“Greater renewable penetration on the grid means longer duration storage is necessary to start to combat some of the issues that are caused by non-dispatchable generation assets,” explained Grejtak.

The interest in flow batteries is rising for longer durations and larger system sizes. These batteries store energy in liquid, typically vanadium ions, rather than solid chemicals like lead or lithium ions. They scale up more easily than solid chemical batteries, facilitating lower costs for large electrical systems like wind farms.

Long duration energy storage for rural microgrids

In countries like Indonesia, Madagascar and the Philippines, there is a drive to provide electricity to customers who have never had access to it. A quick and cheap way to achieve this is with solar microgrids that use long duration energy storage.

Renault is launching today a new  “Advanced Battery Storage” program today.

With the program, the French automaker is aiming to build “the biggest energy stationary storage system using EV batteries ever designed in Europe by 2020.”

While several automakers have now launched “second-life” programs for used electric vehicle battery packs, Renault is in a particularly good position to run those programs because of how it sells many of its electric vehicles.

In some markets, Renault sold most of its Zoe electric vehicles while retaining ownership of the battery packs.

They have also offered battery upgrades – resulting in them having significantly more used battery packs than the average automaker.

Now Renault wants to take advantage of that model with this new energy storage program.

They plan to deploy “at least 60 MWh” of energy storage capacity at several different sites accross Europe.

According to the company, the first facilities will be developed in early 2019 on three sites in France and Germany: at the Renault plants in Douai and Cléon and at a former coal-fired plant in North Rhine-Westphalia.

From there, they plan to “gradually expand over time to contain the energy of 2,000 EV batteries.”

ENGIE North America and Holyoke Gas & Electric (HG&E) today unveiled Massachusetts’ largest utility-scale energy storage system at a ceremony at the Mt. Tom Solar Farm in Holyoke, Massachusetts. ENGIE Storage Services (formerly Green Charge) will operate the 3-MW GridSynergy system, which will be fully integrated into the largest community solar farm in the state at a location adjacent to the former Mt. Tom Power Station. The former coal and oil-fired generation facility, 90 miles west of Boston, operated for more than 50 years and ceased operation in 2014.

The energy storage system will enhance HG&E’s electricity system and help keep electric rates stable by reducing rising capacity charges for the utility and its customers. Additionally, GridSynergy will provide grid stability by responding quickly to electricity demand fluctuations; allow for the increased use of clean energy; and reduce peak load burden on the existing electrical distribution system.

Massachusetts is moving towards generating 45.5% of its electricity from renewable energy by 2035 and energy storage is playing an important role in achieving this milestone. Demand-based costs are rising throughout the New England market, and constituting a large portion of energy costs. This has created increasing pressures to reduce energy usage during peak periods. Over a 20-year term, HG&E will use energy storage to reduce demand peak burden on its electrical distribution system, thus increasing overall asset life. ENGIE storage systems are monitored, optimized, and controlled through its GridSynergy software platform.

“This project is the perfect illustration of energy transformation in action—affordable, clean energy replacing traditional fossil fuel power generation,” said ENGIE NA president and CEO Frank Demaille. “Solar energy, optimized by energy storage, is key to a low-carbon, low-cost energy future.”

“HG&E is excited to expand its relationship with ENGIE, through the integration of this energy storage system (ESS) with the existing large-scale community solar farm at Mt. Tom,” said James Lavelle, HG&E’s manager. “HG&E, and its ratepayers, will receive significant value, as this battery can respond instantaneously to relieve stress on the power grid, and help stabilize costs during period of peak demand or volatile pricing.”

The goal of reaching 100% renewable electricity in California is “100% doable”, the chief commercial officer of zinc bromine flow battery maker Primus Power told Energy-Storage.news at Solar Power International/Energy Storage International.

The opening address and a handful of sessions took place Monday at Anaheim Convention Center, California. While the two shows are national and international, it is expected there will be a great deal of attention paid to the state’s SB100 bill, signed into law recently by Governor Jerry Brown which demands all retail electricity by 2045 comes from renewable sources.

The role of energy storage in that is expected to be a big part of that. Jorg Heinemann, CCO of Primus Power and just a few years ago in charge of utility-scale solar projects at SunPower. A resident of Northern California, Heinemann said he is “thrilled” that his home state is gunning for such an ambitious and forward-thinking target.

However, as a residential solar PV owner, Heinemann said he had few incentives to install a battery at home, since California still has net metering policies in place, rewarding solar generation with high retail rates of buyback from the grid.

“California is a net metering state so financially it’s almost stupid to put a battery in. I can spin the meter backwards and get retail rates. In Germany [where the feed-in tariff has closed], they have to consume it, store it or lose it. 100% renewables for California is 100% doable, but there are some policy questions and things lower down that need to be solved.”

The Primus Power CCO claimed business for his company’s systems, larger scale, long duration flow batteries – among the flow systems from four providers recently profiled in this feature article – has been brisk. As with Hugh McDermott, VP for sales of ESS Inc, another of those companies profiled and who we also spoke to outside SPI on Monday, Heinemann said orders and enquiries have been building up in quantity and scale.