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.
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