Renewable energy is, undeniably, on the rise: solar and wind farms are popping up in the U.S., Europe, China, and Australia, while many companies are planning to source 100 percent of their energy from renewables. Side-by-side with this growing interest in clean energy are equally increasing energy storage needs. According to Spencer Hanes, a business development managing director at the North Carolina-based utility provider Duke Energy, batteries—like Tesla’s Powerwall and Powerpack—are going to take over the U.S. electric grid in five years.

“There’s going to be a lot of excitement around batteries in the next five years. And I would say that the country will get blanketed with projects,” Hanes said on Thursday, speaking as part of a panel at Solar Power Midwest in Chicago, according to Forbes.

Solar and wind farms generate energy at peak periods, when the sun is out and the winds are strong, but these don’t always match the needs of the grid. To remedy this, solar and wind farms, and even utilities, are turning to energy storage batteries. Tesla has a number of projects like this in Australia, while Google parent company Alphabet is working on a similar project in Malta.

CLEANER AND CHEAPER

Aside from batteries in larger energy farms, batteries are also becoming more popular domestically. Soon, more houses are going to be equipped with home batteries, like the Powerwall and Ikea’s home battery packs, as a reaction to the shift to renewables—and because they bring down energy costs. In the U.S., home developers in a number of state, which include New York and California, are making batteries part of their houses. “With the way that the cost curves are coming down it’s a big opportunity for all of us to deliver what customers want,” Hanes added.

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Almost every automaker working on electric cars is also currently looking at ways to leverage their battery technology development into other products. It started with Tesla’s launch of ‘Tesla Energy’ in 2015 and now BMW, Renault, Nissan, and several others have also launched similar products or even new energy divisions.

Daimler has its ‘Mercedes-Benz Energy’ subsidiary and the company unveils today an impressive new project using its vehicle battery packs for stationary energy storage.

The German automaker is putting aside 3,000 battery modules from its production for the third-generation smart electric car toward a new energy storage facility managed by enercity, a German electric utility, in Herrenhausen.

They have already installed 1,800 battery modules out of the total 3,000 and they announced today that they brought the system online.

It is being used to balance out the important amount of solar and wind energy on the German grid:

“In the event of increasing fluctuations in electricity feed-in from renewable energies such as wind and solar energy, such storage units help to ensure optimum balancing of the grid frequency, which must be constantly stabilised. With their storage capacity, they balance the energy fluctuations with virtually no losses – a task which is currently predominantly performed by fast-rotating turbines, rotating masses in large power stations. Around half of the planned system strands is already coupled with the network with an output of 5 MW.”

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As an increasingly high proportion of energy grids are fed by renewable energy, developing storage solutions that can deal with intermittency in sustainably, safely and cost-effectively is key.

Lithium-ion batteries are still the frontrunner technology for large-scale energy storage, and their benefits are clear — high energy densities, relatively low maintenance and a rapidly dropping cost per kWh. But their drawbacks of limited lifespans, explosive failure modes and potentially precarious chains of component supply are equally well publicized.

What battery technologies and chemistries are making waves for stationary storage applications?

All-Iron Flow Batteries (RFB)
Redox Flow Batteries (RFBs) are hardly a new technology, but have received renewed interest in the past few years as grid energy storage solutions. Benefits include long lifespans, theoretically limitless scalability and long discharge times, however, they have been held back by their drawbacks including low energy densities, expensive component costs and in some cases toxic or dangerous electrolyte materials.

Energy Storage Solutions (ESS) have been working on developing and proving the commercial case for their all-iron flow battery which aims to solve several of these issues. In contrast to Vanadium flow batteries, the electrolyte materials are selected for their abundance, safety and low-cost — salt, iron and water. The battery can be transported “dry” and hydrated on site, also lowering logistics costs and improving mobility.

The non-corrosive electrolyte also allows for cheaper materials to be used for the power stack and other battery components. With a mild electrolyte pH (1 to 4) electrode reaction potential lower than the 0.8V carbon corrosion potential, all-iron flow batteries experience little electrode degradation — ESS’s modules experience minimal performance loss over 20 000+ cycles with approximately 70% peak round trip efficiency.

ESS are testing the business case under a contract with the U.S Army Corps of Engineers, with initial cost estimates at have set an estimated cost for their battery at $500/kWh. At this relatively early stage of development, the cost is certainly not attractive enough to compete with Li-on or even Vanadium flow on a wide scale but could be an ideal solution for smaller and/or remote grids.

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After successfully landing a contract to build what would be the world’s largest energy storage system, and to install batteries in New South Wales, Tesla has landed another deal to supply Powerpacks to the first solar and wind energy storage project in the world.

Windlabs, an Australian renewable energy development company, announced on Thursday that they’re moving forward with plans to build a solar and wind energy farm at the Kennedy Energy Park in North Queensland. The project, which costs some $160 million, will be a joint construction under Vesta and Quanta. The former will be providing the wind turbine, and Tesla will be supplying Powerpacks for energy storage.

“Kennedy will consist of 43.2MW Wind, 15MW AC, single axis tracking Solar and 4MWh of Li Ion battery storage. The project will use twelve Vestas V136, 3.6MW turbines at a hub height of 132 meters; the largest wind turbines yet to be deployed in Australia. The Li-Ion storage will be provided by Tesla,” according to the press announcement from Windlabs.

SUSTAINABLE ENERGY ECOSYSTEM

Solar and wind energy, while effective at providing power, require specific circumstances in order to generate energy. It’s necessary, then, to store whatever energy is generated at peak hours so they’ll be available to supply the grid at non-peak times. This is where battery storage comes in; something Tesla has advocated for with the Powerwall and Powerpack.

The Kennedy project’s 4MWh requirement is measly compared to Tesla’s construction of a 100 MW/129 MWh Powerpack energy storage system. Though, as Electrek points out, there is the potential for scaling. “We believe Kennedy Energy Park will demonstrate how effectively wind, solar, and storage can be combined to provide low-cost, reliable and clean energy for Australia’s future,” Roger Price, executive chairman and CEO at Windlabs, said in the press release.

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CHICAGO, October 18, 2017 (Newswire.com) – IHI, Inc. announced today a new 500kW, 2.5MWh energy storage project collocated with a larger facility developed by IHI Corporation, the parent organization of IHI, Inc. The energy storage system is expected to be operational by April 2018.

The facility is intended to alleviate continued grid challenges in order to accelerate the implementation of renewable energy resources, such as photovoltaic (PV) generation systems. The overall project is designed to create an independently sustainable power system by utilizing a variety of installed technologies including on-site hydrogen generation, PV systems, and battery storage to reduce CO² emissions while providing reliable power.

“This energy storage system will change the landscape of generation and consumption in the region, creating an independent and resilient local grid. The success of this effort relies on innovative software capabilities for immediate reaction to various energy needs, such as grid failure, renewable utilization, and other emergency situations,” commented Toshiaki Nishio, Managing Director of the energy storage division of IHI Inc. (hereafter IHI Energy Storage). “IHI Energy Storage is proud to be a key partner in the development of this facility.”

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Greensmith Energy, a Wärtsilä Company, and American Electric Power (AEP) have agreed to install a 4 MW energy storage system integrated with the Buck and Byllesby hydroelectric power plants in southwest Virginia, USA. The integration of advanced energy storage and software with hydroelectric generation is seen to be a world’s first hybridized system of its kind to provide ancillary services.

The system, due to begin operating in the first quarter of 2018, will deliver PJM frequency regulation market (PJM=Pennsylvania, Jersey, Maryland power pool) one of the first new energy storage systems since the adoption of new frequency regulation signals and requirements for regulation service. Harnessing Greensmith’s GEMS software platform that offers multiple storage applications, the project will serve both of PJM’s frequency regulation markets, including traditional regulation known as RegA and dynamic regulation known as RegD.

“The advent and growth of hybridized power, enabled by the integration of intelligent energy storage, has always been a key part of our technology vision,” said Greensmith CEO John Jung. “Although we’ve delivered six grid-scale energy storage systems to the PJM market, this innovative hybrid project will see AEP raise the standard for hydroelectric use-cases globally. And the potential for hybridization is massive as hydroelectricity represents over 1,000 gigawatts of generation globally, roughly a sixth of the world’s total.”

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The new batteries are more efficient and powerful than lithium ion, as well as being safer and more environmentally friendly to manufacture. They are based on the ultra-capacitor principle and feature vertically aligned carbon nanotube electrodes. These have a unique coating which enables the batteries to provide five times the power density than existing ultra-capacitors.

The batteries can be charged and discharged in seconds and can do so over a million cycles without any loss in performance, far in advance of conventional lithium-ion batteries which take minutes, sometimes hours, to fully charge and typically have 5,000 cycle limits.

NAWA Technologies, based in the South of France, has also pioneered a specialised nano-manufacturing process and has begun low volume pilot manufacturing of the batteries. The company believes that key markets for the batteries will include automotive, industrial, defence, aerospace, power tool and personal mobility. They could also play a key role in managing energy across the smart electricity grid.

The company’s Chief Operating Officer (COO), Pascal Boulanger spent 20 years at the CEA (French Atomic and Alternative Energies Organisation), working across a variety of fields including nuclear energy, solar photovoltaics and smart grids. In 2008, he joined one of the first R&D teams in Europe working on new nanocarbon structures: carbon nanotubes and graphene.

Within two years the team of researchers had shown that nanomaterials could be produced on a large scale and at a competitive cost. And in 2013 NAWA Technologies was born, spun off from the CEA, creating 25 jobs in Rousset, in the south of France.

Co-founder of NAWA Technologies is Sales and Marketing VP Ludovic Eveillard, who has held various senior positions in R&D with companies such as Honeywell. Technical Director is Harald Hauf, who has 23 years’ experience in the semiconductor and solar photovoltaic industries, while General Secretary is Veronique Goudet who brings with her huge experience in management, having worked in finance for Deloitte among other companies, and is a trained lawyer.

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The recently revamped SGIP program closed its first funding round in May with $90 million allocated for energy storage projects.

The program has a total of $566 million in funds for clean energy programs, of which 79% are earmarked for energy storage. Under the PUC’s new program, enacted pursuant to AB 1550, 25% of the funds will be earmarked for low income communities, defined as those at or below 80% of the statewide median income or with median household incomes at or below the threshold designated as low income by the Department of Housing and Community Development.

The new program also applies to state and local government agencies, educational institutions, non-profits and small businesses that are located in disadvantaged communities.

“Our actions make the Self-Generation Incentive Program more equitable without increasing consumer costs,” Clifford Rechtschaffen, the PUC commissioner assigned to the proceeding, said in a statement announcing the program.

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AES claims that 20MW of energy storage it deployed in the Dominican Republic just a few weeks before Hurricane Irma, assisted the island nation in keeping power supplies running even as devastation struck.

In late August, local subsidiary AES Dominicana commissioned two 10MW energy storage facilities based on AES Energy Storage’s Advancion platform, which incorporates lithium-ion batteries and forms the building blocks of the company’s grid-scale energy storage solutions. Both are able to store energy for 30 minutes duration.

Following the arrival of Hurrican Irma in the first weeks of September, Energy-Storage.News had asked AES how the Advancion arrays had coped during the extreme weather event. The company was not able to respond directly until it had collated some data and today issued a statement on the situation.

AES said the Andres and Los Mina DPP projects, both in the Santo Domingo region, “played a key role in maintaining grid stability” as both Irma and then Hurricane Maria struck. The two arrays are providing frequency control services to the grid, maintaining balance on the network as it adjusts to second-by-second mismatches in supply and demand. They also support the operation of the Republic’s interconnected electricity system, SENI.

Previously, this frequency regulation was provided by thermal plants running 24/7, but now power plants on the island can be run more efficiently, as the batteries absorb power and then discharge it as needed, quickly and cleanly. AES claims the 20MW of energy storage obviates the need for 60MW of thermal generation capacity to deliver the same level of service.

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SANTA CLARA, Calif.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Green Charge, an ENGIE Company, today announced that BYD is now supplying batteries to Green Charge. Green Charge’s first installation of BYD batteries will be for the recently announced six-megawatt-hour system adjacent to ENGIE’s Mt. Tom Solar farm to serve Holyoke Gas & Electric in western Massachusetts. Designed to optimize intermittent solar energy and contribute to rate stabilization for Holyoke Gas & Electric customers over the next 20 years, this energy storage project will be the largest utility-scale energy storage installation in Massachusetts. To date, BYD has installed more than 550 MWh of energy storage systems worldwide.

“BYD has a proven track record with product at scale production,” said Vic Shao, CEO at Green Charge. “Our first installation of utility-scale energy storage with Holyoke Gas & Electric is an extremely important milestone not just for Massachusetts but for customers benefiting from reduced utility capacity costs all while reducing stress on the HG&E grid system.”

Green Charge is the number one energy storage company as named by Navigant Research. Green Charge develops turnkey grid scale energy storage projects and has a strong history of developing commercial and industrial projects.

“We are pleased that BYD was chosen by Green Charge as its trusted partner for this project with Holyoke Gas & Electric based on our global expertise in battery technology and energy storage,” said Micheal Austin, BYD Vice President. “BYD has led the charge to improve the way we power our communities, and we will continue to lead as the only storage supplier that not only manufacturers rechargeable cells, but also the bi-directional inverters integrated in grid-tied containerized systems. BYD is helping make the transition to renewable energy possible.”

As one of the world’s leading new energy technology companies, BYD has shipped approximately 1-GW worth of solar modules in the U.S and has captured nearly 50-percent market share in the frequency regulation energy storage market – or about 25 percent of the entire American energy storage market. In addition, BYD is the largest consumer electric vehicle and electric bus manufacturer in the world.

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