Florida Power & Light Co. (FPL) announced plans to build the world’s largest solar-powered battery system, which will have four times the capacity of the largest battery system in operation.

FPL, the utility owned by NextEra Energy, plans to build a 409-megawatt energy storage project – the equivalent of approximately 100 million iPhone batteries. The future FPL Manatee Energy Storage Center should be operational in late 2021.

Wood Mackenzie senior storage analyst Dan Finn-Foley said the project is the largest to be unveiled in the U.S. to date and will be four times the size of the world’s largest on a megawatt basis, according to Green Tech Media.

Manatee will be able to distribute 900 megawatt-hours of electricity, enough to power 329,000 homes for 2 hours, and will be charged using an existing FPL solar power plant in Manatee County. By using stored energy when there is a higher demand for power, this will reduce the demand for running other power plants, thus reducing emissions even further.

“Replacing a large, aging fossil fuel plant with a mega battery that’s adjacent to a large solar plant is another world-first accomplishment and while I’m very pleased with that fact, what I’m most proud of is that our team remained committed to developing this clean energy breakthrough while saving customers money and keeping their bills among the lowest in the nation,” Eric Silagy, president and CEO of FPL, said.

Silagy is referring to two aging natural gas-fired power plants, built in the 1970s. Besides the Manatee storage center, FPL is also planning on installing a number of smaller battery units across the state, as well as more solar power plants. The project will save customers more than $100 million and eliminate more than 1 million tons of carbon dioxide emissions.

Blood is in the water, and coal is the chum.

On March 26, 2019, Illinois State Representative Luis Arroyo filed an amendment to House Bill 2713, the Coal to Solar and Energy Storage Act. The legislation aims to create a financial structure to keep at-risk coal plants online through 2024, while funding a build-out of solar+storage, energy efficiency, and transmission to replace the lost capacity. The legislation is strongly supported by Vistra Energy.

Just last year, a study sponsored by NRDC and Sierra Club finds that these specific old coal plants can be retired and safely replaced by solar and other resources. The study was written specifically to counter a push by Vistra Energy to gain subsidies for its old plants.

Vistra Energy and its subsidiaries own 5.5 GW of coal resources within the region noted in the legislation (MISO Zone 4), which represents 40% of the summer capacity within that region. The company is seemingly a (the?) major backer, as noted by their website and press releases supporting the document.

The power company is also a developer of some of the largest solar+storage projects in various markets – for instance, a 300 MW / 1,200 MWh energy storage facility for California, and first Texas’ largest solar facility, then its largest battery – at said solar facility.

The Vistra press release notes that the legislation will help make use of the already existing infrastructure and land at Vistra’s existing facilities. 500 MW of solar power, with no specific notes on the storage size, is suggested at the available land currently occupied by coal plants. Facilities without land for solar are to be offered a 10-year grant to install 40 to 80 MW of energy storage, taking advantage of already existing interconnection and transmission hardware.

In addition to the repurposing of existing locations, the legislation also aims to increase electricity generation from renewable sources to 800 to 1,000 GWh a year, via statewide procurement from system sizes between 20 and 80 MWac. These generation procurements will be required to include energy storage “having a storage capacity in megawatt-hours equal to or greater than the product of the electric generating capacity of the new renewable energy resource in megawatts times 0.5”. In other words, 10 MW of storage as the minimum for a 20 MW solar plant.

The Intertubes are ablaze with news that the Earth holds 530,000 potential sites for pumped hydro energy storage in its hot little hands. If that sounds too good to be true, well, maybe. The devil is in the details. On the other hand, the number-crunching does indicate that a massive amount of energy storage capacity is already close at hand, even without fancy new breakthroughs in battery technology.

What’s The Big Deal With Pumped Hydro Energy Storage?
The new pumped hydro numbers come from a study by researchers at Australian National University. It follows a 2017 ANU study that found the potential for 22,000 pumped hydro sites in Australia alone.

For those of you new to the topic, pumped hydro energy storage refers to pumping water uphill to a reservoir. After that, gravity does all the work. The stored energy — in the form of water — is let loose on turbines to generate electricity on demand.

Pumped hydro has limited utility when fossil fuels do the pumping. It is mainly used for load balancing, meaning the reservoir typically refreshes once a day.

With renewables on the scene it’s a whole new kettle of fish. In a mixed grid, pumped hydro facilities respond to shifts in wind and solar production as well as demand.

If that sounds pretty simple, it is. For all the hoopla over the latest battery technology, pumped hydro “water batteries” still account for more than 90% of global energy storage, and they are still the lowest cost, scaled-up form of energy storage.

Italy must more than double its capacity to store electricity if it wants to slash pollution from burning fossil fuels, the head of the nation’s power transmission network said.

Terna SpA Chief Executive Officer Luigi Ferraris said Italy may need as many as 6 gigawatts of storage by 2030 to balance a boom in renewables. Storage is one of the ways the grid can balance intermittent flows of electricity from wind and solar farms, which generate only when it’s breezy or sunny.

The comments show how Terna’s plan to invest a record 6.2 billion euros ($7 billion) will shape Italy’s power grid. Most of the country’s 4.8 gigawatts of storage capacity currently comes from pumped hydro plants, where water is stored in a reservoir and then allowed to flow over a generation turbine during times of peak power demand, according to BloombergNEF.

“This is an opportunity not only for the energy sector but also for agriculture,” Ferraris said. “We need sites to store water for agriculture. There could be multiple uses for these sites.’’

Italy’s Power Generation
Pumped storage is currently a small portion of Italy’s 115 gigawatts of capacity but may grow 6 GW by 2030.

His remarks add to the case for pumped hydro plants that other utilities including Iberdrola SA are making. While investors are abuzz about the prospects for deploying batteries on a big enough scale to balance power flows, Ferraris says “electrochemical” technologies aren’t yet advanced enough to act as a buffer at the scale utilities need.

Italy estimates it will add 40 gigawatts of renewable generation capacity by 2030, three-quarters of which will be solar photovoltaics. That will help compensate for closing 7.2 gigawatts of coal plants.

One of the biggest criticisms of renewables is that they don’t always provide power since the wind doesn’t always blow, and the sun isn’t always shining. Because renewable electricity generation can be intermittent, it’s at a disadvantage to coal, natural gas, and nuclear power plants that produce steady power.

Many utilities work around these intermittence issues by also building cleaner gas-fired plants, which can provide power on demand and is a cheaper alternative to battery storage. However, NextEra Energy (NYSE: NEE) is leading the way in developing next-generation energy facilities that include battery storage so that they produce a steady stream of clean power. The company recently announced two groundbreaking projects that could serve as a blueprint for renewable development in the future.

Leading the way
Last month, NextEra Energy unveiled plans to build a first-of-its-kind energy facility in Oregon. The Wheatridge Renewable Energy Facility will combine 300 MW of wind, 50 MW of solar, and 30 MW of battery storage, marking the first time in North America that all three technologies will be co-located and integrated into one energy generating facility. It will also be one of the largest solar farms in that state as well as one of the biggest battery storage projects in the country. NextEra is building the project with utility Portland General Electric (NYSE: POR) , which will own 100 MW of the wind farm while buying the power produced under a 30-year purchase agreement. Portland General Electric’s CEO, Maria Pope, sees the project serving as a “model for integrating renewable generation and storage to cost-effectively reduce emissions while maintaining a reliable grid.”

Meanwhile, NextEra’s utility, Florida Power & Light, recently detailed plans to build the world’s largest solar-powered battery system. The Manatee Energy Storage Center will have 409 MW of capacity, which is four times the size of the largest battery system currently in operation. The company is co-locating this facility at an existing solar power plant, which will charge the batteries during the day, allowing them to supply electricity during periods of peak demand. The project will increase the predictability of solar, enabling the company to provide clean power even when the sun isn’t shining. The battery storage system will replace an aging fossil fuel plant that had been helping bridge that gap.

A future where 100% of the world’s electricity comes from clean energy sources isn’t just wishful thinking – it’s mandated by the hard realities of climate change. Getting energy from fossil fuels is a hard habit for humanity to break, but the good news is that momentum finally is on the side of renewable energy and energy storage. Renewables targets at every level of government, new capacity market rules being implemented by grid operators, and the availability and cost-effectiveness of long-duration energy storage resources are all helping create a major paradigm shift in the energy industry.

Across the United States, several states and more than 100 cities have adopted ambitious 100% clean energy goals. Xcel Energy made a landmark announcement in late 2018 as the first US utility to commit to fully providing clean energy with a pledge to supply 100% carbon-free electricity by 2050 across its service area in eight US states.

Europe has made even greater progress. Most European countries have set similar renewables targets, and some have made significant headway. Germany gets 36% of its electricity from renewable sources, Denmark gets over 50% and Iceland generates the most clean electric-ity per person on earth, with almost 100% of its energy coming from renewables.

The quantum leaps we’re seeing in the market are also possible because the cost of renewable energy is on par with fossil-fuel generation. The levelised cost of electricity (LCOE) for utility-scale solar fell 85% from US$350/MWh in 2009 to US$50/MWh in 2017, and according to the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, is expected to drop to US$37/MWh by 2050. The wind industry saw similar price drops, with the mean wind energy LCOE dropping to US$45/MWh in 2017.

Competitive prices are helping to spur unprecedented levels of renewables deployments. The U.S. Energy Informa-tion Administration projects that from 2020 to 2050 utility-scale wind capacity will grow by 20GW and utility-scale solar photovoltaic capacity will grow by 127GW in the United States alone. With these market drivers making renewables smart business, it’s clear that the march toward 100% clean energy is much more than a political movement.

A booming market for home solar energy systems is bringing battery storage into the spotlight, but households are being urged to crunch the numbers first.

While solar panel prices have dropped sharply and can now pay for themselves in less than four years, battery systems — which store solar energy for use at night — don’t deliver the same financial benefits yet.

Batteries alone can still take 10-15 years to recover their cost, but solar specialists say there are other reasons tempting buyers, including environmental benefits and protection from blackouts.

Home solar system numbers surged 12 per cent nationally last year to 2.02 million, costing as little as $5000 for a large system. But a typical battery costs about $15,000.

ZEN Energy founder Richard Turner said new players were coming into the battery supply market, which would bring down costs.

“The market I think will get very competitive in the next 12 months and pricing will continue to tumble, like solar has,” he said.

Not all batteries deliver blackout back-up, but households wanting to go green are still signing up, with help from energy incentives in some states.

“Instead of 30-40 per cent of energy from solar you are getting 70-80-90 per cent of your energy from the sun — that’s driving a lot of people,” Mr Turner said.

Home battery customer Jim Young said he had cut power bills by 50-60 per cent since having his battery installed. “The battery makes it possible to spread the efficiency of the system into the evening hours when there’s no sun being generated,” he said.

Tesla has built another Powerpack system in record time, this time at Osaka train station in Japan, where it will be used as emergency backup and to reduce peak energy demand. According to the company on Twitter, the 42 Powerpack units will provide enough energy to safely move a train and its passengers for up to 30 minutes to the nearest station in the event of a power failure.

Tesla says the 7MWh project makes this one its biggest energy storage development in Asia, and like its giant Australian Powerpack system, it was completed with eye-watering speed — the hardware was apparently installed in just two days.

Osaka’s trains are some of the busiest in Japan, transporting millions of people every day, so Tesla’s Powerpack will undoubtedly prove a blessing during power interruptions. While the company’s energy division tends to take a backseat to its EV work, its 2018 figures show it’s playing an increasingly prominent role not only within the Tesla empire, but across the energy storage landscape in general. Last year the company deployed 1.04Gwh of energy storage, nearly triple the 358MWh rolled out in 2017.

Update (3/27 7 PM): This post has been updated to reflect that Osaka Powerpack is Tesla’s largest energy storage system in Asia, not the largest one in all of Asia.