New York State is ready to jump-start energy storage and renewable resource projects to modernize their energy grid. To do so, the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) is offering project managers the chance to receive funding from a fund worth $15.5 million. This money is just one part of a larger, Clean Energy Fund that consists of $5.3 billion.
Africa’s first utility-scale battery storage installation has been agreed upon this week thanks to the U.S. Trade and Development Agency and Obama’s Power Africa Initiative.
Trying to compare different types of energy storage is a bit like trying to compare the color green to the color blue. Here we take a stab at defining the market potential for long-duration energy storage and offer considerations for potential buyers of this new technology.
The General Assembly of Maryland just passed a bill that would provide a 30% tax credit to those who chose to utilize energy storage technology, making it the first state in the country to pass such legislation. The funds provided by the bill would last from 2018 to 2022. The bill includes a cap of $5,000 for residential storage projects, while for commercial projects, the cap is set at $75,000. The state government has allocated a total of $750,000 per year to be used in credits.
A new company is coming in hot with their energy storage technology, dependent on 900 degree Fahrenheit molten metals. Ambri has developed a battery storage system that is relatively simple, developing reliable power and displaying rechargeable capabilities. This “hot” ticket item has caught the attention of some major, noteworthy investors including Bill Gates, Total, a French energy company, and at least three other large investors. So far, Ambri has received $50 million in investments for their research, development, and manufacturing. These investments are supplementing a grant from the Massachusetts’s Clean Energy Center awarded to the company to assist with maintaining operations and development.
California has recently made large strides in solar technology. However, the state also has ambitions in energy storage, becoming the national leader for the deployment of energy storage. Acting on these ambitions, the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) has released a proposal to double funding for SGIP, or the Self Generation Incentive Program. This program, started in 2001, has played a huge hand in getting California the energy storage numbers it now boasts. It is an important impetus driving consumer-sited energy storage.
Parker Hannifin an American energy company, recently announced the completion of the Cochrane energy storage facility, a project undertaken with AES Gener. The partnership with the Chilean energy producer and supplier has resulted in a large plant located Mejillones, Antofagasta, Chile. The facility will provide spinning reserve and grid reliability services to Northern Chile, part of the Norte Grande Interconnected System. This system in particular primarily provides energy to the country’s mining operations, which take place in the north. The facility can provide 20 megawatts of energy storage.
WASHINGTON — The Energy Department’s Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) today announced $37 million in funding for 16 innovative new projects as part of a new ARPA-E program: Integration and Optimization of Novel Ion-Conducting Solids (IONICS). IONICS project teams are paving the way for technologies that overcome the limitations of current battery and fuel cell products.
There’s definitely a value to storing solar energy in batteries, and then discharging that energy to meet grid and customer needs. Measuring that value — and finding a way to share it between battery-equipped solar customers and their utilities — is a trickier matter. Out in Sacramento, Calif., a long-running solar-storage pilot project has been testing out this interplay. The city’s utility, Sacramento Municipal Utility District (SMUD), has been working with startup Sunverge to align the operation of 34 battery-backed, PV-equipped homes with its needs to shave peak demand in late summer afternoons, when air-conditioning loads put stress on the grid.
Bill Roush, Renewable Energy Consultant for Black & Veatch’s energy business, said third-party energy storage technologies are also altering how electric utilities function. With the Teslas and Daimlers of the world working to install behind-the-meter battery storage for commercial and industrial utility customers, electric utilities are facing a variety of challenges and opportunities.
As California races towards a clean energy future, not only do we need new aggressive goals for all sectors, but we also need to rethink how we manage distributed energy resources, like rooftop solar and customer side energy storage. This is particularly true for one such resource, energy efficiency. Two weeks ago, the California legislature passed a number of clean energy related bills including SB 350 (De León), a bill that sets the state on a path to achieve Governor Brown’s ambitious clean energy goals. The governor’s “50/50/50” plan aims to increase electricity from renewable sources to 50 percent, reduce petroleum use by 50 percent, and double building efficiency by 2030.
At this week’s Solar Power International conference, a group of executives from Abengoa Solar, BrightSource Energy and SolarReserve spoke about where opportunities lie for their businesses. While they still plan eventually to build projects in the U.S., the three companies are turning to countries where they say CSP with storage offers a higher value. “A lot of us are running around internationally,” said Kevin Smith, the CEO of SolarReserve. “These are countries with less-developed grids where the value of storage is better realized.”
One challenge for New York utilities is how to engage with the Reforming Energy Vision (REV) proceeding and explain things to customers when customer engagement is quite low, Chris Cavanagh, Principal Program Manager at National Grid’s Market Strategy Group told the audience. “We need more than meters, we need to get customers interested,” he said.
The ideas in play include allowing aggregated DERs to earn a broad, averaged-out wholesale price for the energy they export to the grid, opening up access to payments based on the cost of wholesale power at specific points on the grid, or even creating opportunities to play in ERCOT’s lucrative energy and ancillary services markets.
U.S. Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz launched several new initiatives with other global energy leaders at the Energy and Climate Partnership of the Americas (ECPA) and the sixth Clean Energy Ministerial (CEM6) this week in Merida, Mexico. These initiatives will further strengthen momentum in the Western Hemisphere and around the globe to combat climate change and accelerate clean energy technology and policies ahead of the December 2015 climate talks in Paris.
But with stagnant electricity demand and the growth of distributed energy undercutting the traditional utility business model, utilities are under increasing pressure to expand the definitions of what businesses they’re in. GTM Research’s latest report, Alternate Utility Revenue Streams: Expanding Utility Business Models at the Grid Edge, takes an in-depth look at the multitude of alternative revenue models being explored by the country’s biggest utilities.
The Energy Efficiency Improvement Act of 2015, which President Obama signed into law on April 30, will add momentum to falling energy consumption per capita in the United States by reducing energy demand from commercial buildings, manufacturing plants, and homes. The prospect of a larger energy efficiency bill would impact many facets of the energy industry, particularly utilities that service regions with federal customers and energy efficiency companies that would address new building codes and other requirements. Efforts to reduce electricity consumption would have implications for both utilities and the energy efficiency industry.
During his State of the State address, Governor Brown proposed a goal of 50 percent renewable energy on California’s electric grid by 2030. Since then, State Senators and Assembly Members have introduced bills to turn the goal into law. The bills are quite clear on the 50 percent goal, but scant on details, raising the question – is this bold goal realistic?
A microgrid is a local energy grid with control capability, which means it can disconnect from the traditional grid and operate autonomously. To understand how a microgrid works, you first have to understand how the grid works. The grid connects homes, businesses and other buildings to central power sources, which allow us to use appliances, heating/cooling systems and electronics. But this interconnectedness means that when part of the grid needs to be repaired, everyone is affected.
The first and probably the most relevant constraint to electricity markets is transmission grid capacity. Despite the liberalization of the sector, in many countries congestion continues to be a hindrance for competitive prices. Italy is one such country. Data on day-ahead market prices show a decrease in the last few years which has been principally driven by technological variables. Just think about the fact that Italy covers 38.6% of its power production with renewable energy sources (wind and solar).
Randy Knowles figures he’s moving in the right direction. “They used to call me crazy,” he said with a self-effacing chuckle. “Now they’re calling me audacious.” For well over a decade, the Klickitat (Washington) Public Utility District commissioner has promoted building a big pumped storage project off-stream from the Columbia River at the John Day Dam, 110 miles upriver from Portland, Oregon. Now, after years of holding a preliminary permit to study the possibility, the district is moving to obtain a license from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.
The electricity grid is set for a major transformation – arguably one of its biggest since the inception of the grid – and energy storage is going to play a center stage role. The radical pace of innovation is driven by governments, utilities and energy companies whose understanding and acceptance that the way energy is generated and distributed has changed, and is continuing to change at an increasingly rapid rate. With renewable energy now a major part of the mainstream grid and the drive to move away from nuclear and fossil fuels, it is clear that energy storage is the missing link.
For more than 100 years, the U.S. power system relied on fossil-fueled power plants to meet our growing energy demand. Now, clean energy resources like renewables are quickly changing our energy mix. But what happens when the sun isn’t shining or the wind isn’t blowing? What about when power demand momentarily outpaces supply? That’s where batteries and energy storage come in, offering a fundamental, even disruptive change to the U.S. electricity system as we know it.
For example, innovative tools like demand response allow third parties or utilities to turn off pre-approved appliances – like swimming pool pumps and air conditioners – remotely when the power grid is stressed and needs a quick reduction in energy ...