Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy (SGRE) has begun the operation of an electric thermal energy storage system (ETES) in Hamburg-Altenwerder, Germany.

The technology makes it possible to store large quantities of energy cost-effectively and thus decouple electricity generation and use, explains SGRE, which calls the system a “world first.”

The heat storage facility, which was ceremonially opened on Wednesday, contains around 1,000 metric tons of volcanic rock as an energy storage medium. It is fed with electrical energy converted into hot air by means of a resistance heater and a blower that heats the rock to 750 degrees C. When demand peaks, the ETES uses a steam turbine for the re-electrification of the stored energy.

The ETES pilot plant can store up to 130 MWh of thermal energy for a week. In addition, the storage capacity of the system remains constant throughout the charging cycles.

For the next step, Siemens Gamesa plans to use the technology in commercial projects and scale up the storage capacity and power. The goal is to store energy in the range of several gigawatt-hours in the near future.

“With the commissioning of our ETES pilot plant, we have reached an important milestone on the way to introducing high-performance energy storage systems,” says Markus Tacke, CEO of SGRE. “Our technology makes it possible to store electricity for many thousands of households at low cost. We are thus presenting an elementary building block for the further expansion of renewable energy and the success of the energy transition.”

The Institute for Engineering Thermodynamics at Hamburg University of Technology and local utility company Hamburg Energie are partners in the innovative Future Energy Solutions project, which is funded by the German Federal Ministry of Economics and Energy within the “6. Energieforschungsprogramm” research program. TU Hamburg carries out research into the thermodynamic fundamentals of the solid bulk technology used.

One of India’s leading renewable energy project developers has achieved a major milestone in implementation of two ambitious energy storage projects in the states of Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka.

Media outlets recently reported that Greenko Energy Holdings managed to secure equity investment worth $495 million to fund two pumped hydro energy storage projects it is currently working on in the southern state of Andhra Pradesh.

The equity investments have been made by Singapore government-backed group GIC and the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA). The funds will be used towards the implementation of pumped hydro energy storage projects at Pinnapuram and Saundatti. The total cost for both the projects is estimated at $2 billion.

The company is said to have achieved financial closure for the Pinnapuram Storage Project while it is in negotiations to achieve the same for the Saundatti Project.

The Pinnapuram Integrated Renewable Energy Storage Project (IRESP), located in Andhra Pradesh, will consist of 2 gigawatts of solar power and 2 gigawatts of wind energy capacity with pumped hydro storage capacity of 8,000 MWh. The project shall be designed for a discharge duration of eight hours. The project is estimated to generate 2.77 billion kilowatt-hours of energy every year at a cycle efficiency of 76.1%.

The Saundatti Integrated Renewable Energy Storage Project (IRESP), located in Karnataka, will consist of 2 gigawatts of solar power and 2 gigawatts of wind energy capacity with pumped hydro storage capacity of 9,600 MWh. The project shall be designed for a discharge duration of eight hours. The project is estimated to generate 3.32 billion kilowatt-hours of energy every year at a cycle efficiency of 76.7%.

The two projects will give Greenko a major headway in terms of access to dispatchable renewable energy, an asset whose value will increase significantly as renewable energy capacity in the country increases sharply over the next few years.

Greenko Energy Holdings is backed by GIC and ADIA and has made large acquisitions to become one of the largest independent renewable energy generators in India. The company acquired Orange Renewables, a wind energy developer and also bought assets of SunEdison India when its US parent filed for bankruptcy.

While sources such as solar and wind may be good for the planet, they do not promise a constant and predictable stream of power in the way that fossil fuels do. 

Given this fact, if renewables are to become a crucial part of the planet’s energy mix, they will need to rely on smart and intuitive energy storage systems. 

In the U.S., California-based Stem is using artificial intelligence to help businesses store energy on a large scale.

The idea is to pair artificial intelligence (AI) with energy storage so that businesses and organizations can, according to Stem, “automate energy cost savings and protect against changing rates.” Customers include major firms like Adobe Systems, Bed Bath & Beyond and Whole Foods Market. 

“We build and operate the largest digitally connected network of intelligent energy storage solutions,” Stem’s CEO, John Carrington, told CNBC’s “Sustainable Energy.”

“It’s all cloud-enabled and it’s driven by our AI software platform that we call Athena,” Carrington added, explaining that the company’s technology offered businesses both flexibility and control when it came to their energy spend.

“We lower cost by storing electricity when it’s affordable and using it later when costs are high, shifting energy away from the most expensive times of day,” Carrington said.

Explaining the firm’s model further, Stem’s CTO Larsh Johnson said that it used AI to predict both a client’s needs and the availability and cost of supply, including the sustainability of that supply.

This, Johnson added, enabled Stem to “match a customer’s requirements with the availability of energy both from the grid and from any onsite renewable generation.”

Iowa economic development officials are tentatively endorsing a tax credit for battery storage to complement the state’s wind and solar generation.

The tax credit is one of several recommendations made in a recent report on energy storage opportunities by the Iowa Economic Development Authority. Others include targeting grant money and conducting additional research, including a “value of storage” analysis.

“We are seeking to move the needle,” said Brian Selinger, who, as the agency’s energy team leader, was involved in developing the Energy Storage Action Plan.

Storage was highlighted in a 2016 state energy plan. State leaders think storage could offer a host of benefits, such as enhancing the productivity of wind and solar, reducing energy costs, enhancing grid reliability, and creating jobs.

The new report suggests tethering a state storage tax credit to a proposed federal tax credit. The Energy Storage Tax Incentive and Deployment Act, introduced in the U.S. House in April, would offer electric storage systems the same 30% investment tax credit now available for solar photovoltaic systems. There is a federal tax credit for storage that meets some specific requirements.

“It’s helpful if we can see that support coming federally first,” Selinger said. “That would send a nice signal. As with solar, then Iowa can say, ‘The federal government has done something; maybe we can layer something on that.’”

Maryland is the only state with a storage tax credit. Several others including New Mexico and Hawaii have discussed it or extended other incentives such as grants, rebates, feed-in tariffs and exemptions from personal property tax, according to James Burwen, vice president of the Energy Storage Association.

Selinger said Iowa officials still need a much better understanding of how storage would work in the state before they would recommend legislation to create the tax credit.

The Ministry of New and Renewable Energy in India is looking beyond batteries to push energy storage in the renewable energy and grid balancing and support sector.

The Ministry recently issued a document calling upon companies to submit proposals for gravity storage projects. Gravity storage is seen as an energy storage solution with very short response time and high flexibility. India may be looking at multiple applications by utilizing gravity storage systems — grid balancing, stabilization of renewable energy discharge, etc..

Gravity storage works on the same principle as a pumped hydro project, with storage of potential energy at times of surplus, converting that stored potential energy into kinetic energy and, finally, into electricity. Usually a large mass (rock or concrete) is lifted using hydraulic pressure to store potential energy. To generate energy, the large mass is dropped, which pushes a large volume of water through a turbine, similar to the operation in a pumped hydro or a normal hydro power project.

At present, India has no major battery-based energy storage projects despite having floated a few large tenders for the same. The country, however, has 2.6 gigawatts of operational and another 3.1 gigawatts of under-construction pumped hydro storage projects.

Gravity-based storage systems based on solid mass are certainly a technology that can be implemented in India, as it is comparable to pumped hydro in several operational aspects. According to Heindl Energy, the efficiency of gravity storage is around 80%, nearly same as that of pumped hydro storage. A study by the Imperial College of London estimates the levelized cost of Heindl’s technology at $106 per megawatt-hour compared to $206 per megawatt-hour for pumped hydro.

University of Nottingham and the World Society of Sustainable Energy Technologies are working on gravity storage systems integrated into abandoned mines. The technology, submitted for patent, is called EarthPumpStore. The University ‘estimates that 150,000 abandoned mines in China could deliver an estimated storage capacity of 250 terawatt-hours’.

An innovative gravity storage system is reportedly in works by the Advanced Rail Energy Storage (ARES) in the United States. The company received approval for its first commercial project in 2016. The project is expected to be implemented in Nevada. Following is a summary of its operational aspect.

Australia is poised for a transformation of its electricity system – but not in the ways you’ve heard before.

In recent months, transmission companies around the world have been increasingly considering energy storage as the means to supplement a fundamental part of our electric power infrastructure: the poles and wires that carry high-voltage current from power plant to end-users.

Battery-based energy storage offers a solution for adding needed capacity – “virtual transmission” – on Australia’s transmission corridors, increasing system reliability and the NEM’s ability to move power between states, on far faster timelines and at less cost than traditional infrastructure.

Congestion on Australia’s transmission network is not an issue on most people’s minds but has significant impacts across the economy. Network congestion continues to make headlines in Sydney and Melbourne during the heat of summer, when temperatures often hit 50 degrees C.

Transmission lines are running at full capacity but still are not able to serve all the load during the hottest day.

A single transmission line outage across the state boundary can create power price surges of $14,000/MWh or brownouts – as happened in New South Wales during August 2018, when the QLD-NSW interconnector tripped due to a lightning strike.

While several initiatives being pursued at the state and national levels aim to increase critical transmission capacity and reduce network congestion, energy storage can play – and should be considered – in helping address this specific issue.

The New York Power Authority is partnering with Westchester County to develop and implement solar photovoltaic and energy storage systems at seven county-owned properties, including bus garages, the Westchester County Courthouse and Hilltop Hanover Farm.

The new systems are expected to offset more than 2,800 tons of greenhouse gases each year, which is equivalent to removing more than 600 cars from the road. These projects were highlighted today at a Westchester County and NYPA-hosted Clean Energy Forum at NYPA’s White Plains headquarters where local municipalities and school districts learned about available energy services and clean energy alternatives.

The solar projects and renewable energy and financing services for municipalities offered at the forum support Governor Andrew M. Cuomo’s Green New Deal, a clean energy and jobs agenda that strives to achieve 100 percent clean electricity by 2040.

NYPA issued a public solicitation seeking proposals for a total 8 MW of distributed solar capacity with the ability to incorporate energy storage at multiple county-owned facilities. For these projects, the county and NYPA conducted preliminary assessments to identify the most feasible and appropriate locations to install solar PV systems.

The project sites include county-owned buildings, and involve rooftop, ground-mounted, and parking lot canopy solar installation technologies. In addition, NYPA and the county requested through the solicitation, energy storage systems at several project sites to support a multitude of applications including demand charge reduction and peak load shaving.

The solicitation closed on May 21 and the responses received are under evaluation. NYPA and the county anticipate selecting a developer and awarding the project this summer with construction expected to start in 2020.

A 10MW battery energy storage system (BESS), which will allow a 24MW wind farm to keep generating energy even in times of oversupply, officially went into service today near Rotterdam, the Netherlands.

The old stereotype of Holland as a country of windmills holds particularly true in this northerly region, where the old kind of windmills have been commonly used for centuries. The modern wind farm, on the Hartel canal, can produce 68GWh of electricity each year. When winds are high, this can mean the farm produces more electricity than the local network demands.

As it is, “the wind turbines might have to be turned down in order to prevent oversupply in the system,” Maurice Koenen, manager of sourcing and portfolio management at developer Greenchoice said.

“The wind energy can be stored in the batteries and delivered to the energy network at a later time. On top of that, the battery system can deliver smart energy services which help keep the European network in balance at 50Hz,” Koenen said.

Energy-Storage.news requested the megawatt-hour capacity of the battery system – which will provide both load shifting from the wind farm and frequency regulation services – from the project partners, which included solutions provider Spectral, but did not receive a reply ahead of publication. A similar use case for a BESS was found at Prinses Alexia Windpark in the central Netherlands, where a 3MW wind power-integrating energy storage system using BMW car batteries was delivered by electrical equipment and system integration company Alfen.

Network needs flexibility, congestion relief
While it is claimed to be the largest battery system connected to a wind farm in Holland, it is thought to be equal in size to Holland’s existing largest standalone battery storage facility, a 10MW AES project connected in January 2016. At the time of that system’s connection, transmission network operator Tennet was quoted as saying that batteries were an “excellent alternative” to conventional power plants in providing balancing services, especially in complement to growing penetration of renewables on the grid.

The speculative field of gravity-based energy storage got a boost recently with news of a strategic investment and new patents.

Swiss-U.S. startup Energy Vault, one of the most high-profile gravity storage players to date, secured financial backing from Cemex Ventures, the corporate venture capital unit of the world’s second-largest building materials giant, and a pledge to help with deployment through Cemex’s “strategic network.”

Meanwhile, the University of Nottingham and the World Society of Sustainable Energy Technologies confirmed the filing of patent applications for a concept called EarthPumpStore, which uses abandoned mines as gravity storage assets.

Implementing the technology across 150,000 disused open-cast mines in China alone could deliver an estimated storage capacity of 250 terawatt-hours, the University of Nottingham said in a press note.

The announcements indicate growing interest in a class of energy storage concepts that appear seductively simple but have yet to gain widespread acceptance.

Most gravity storage concepts are based on the idea of using spare electricity to lift a heavy block, so the energy can be recovered when needed by letting the weight drop down again.

In the case of Energy Vault, the blocks are made of concrete and are lifted up by cranes 33 stories high. EarthPumpStore, meanwhile, envisages pulling containers filled with compacted earth up the sides of open-cast mines.

Gravity is also the force underpinning pumped hydro, the most widespread and cost-effective form of energy storage in the world. But pumped hydro development is slow and costly, requiring sites with specific topographical characteristics and often involving significant permitting hurdles.

Houston — If Trump administration threats to raise to 25% US tariffs on Chinese imports of lithium-ion batteries and inverters are eventually enforced, the installed price for a four-hour duration battery would increase by about 15%, an analyst at S&P Global Platts Analytics said Thursday.

“The lithium-ion battery accounts for 40% to 60% of the total installed cost of a standalone battery storage asset in the US,” Felix Maire, clean energy and storage senior analyst at S&P Global Platts Analytics, said Thursday.
“The impact of the tariff would vary project by project, but we estimate a 25% tariff on both lithium-ion batteries and inverter could increase the installed prices for a four-hour duration battery by about 15%.”

In a series of announcements by US Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer in May, the Trump administration provided a long list of items on which tariffs were planned. On May 10, Lighthizer said the US would increase the level of tariffs from 10% to 25% on $200 billion worth of Chinese imports under Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974.

Those tariffs, however, have not been put in place and there is no date certain for them to be implemented.

The Trump administration used the proposed tariffs as a threat to bring pressure on the Chinese government to conclude talks on a broad-based trade agreement. By May 21, those talks had broken down and have not been resumed.

But in recent weeks, however, several analyst groups have worked to calculate just what the proposed tariffs might mean to the growing battery electric storage system business in the US. Numerous battery installation companies have argued over the past two years that the cost of installing a battery storage system has been on the decline.

Two key items — lithium-ion batteries for use in storage systems and static converters also used in storage systems — were on the May 13 list of items the USTA said it would raise tariffs on.

Yayoi Sekine, energy storage analyst at BloombergNEF, said during an Energy Storage Association webinar Wednesday that the 2019 estimated price of a stationary storage lithium-ion battery was $185/kWh. If imported from China with a 25% tariff applied, the battery itself would cost $235/kWh. If tariffs on all the components of a 20 MW/80 MW energy storage system were included, the aggregated impact would be an 18% system cost increase to $338/KWh, Sekine said.