Energy rules need to be changed to ensure households that don't embrace new technologies such as battery storage and solar photovoltaic systems are not left picking up the bill, federal Energy Minister Josh Frydenberg says.
As state and federal leaders prepare to discuss energy issues at next week's Council of Australian Governments meeting, Mr Frydenberg said the National Electricity Market had to change to adapt to the influx of new technologies such as wind and solar.
But he said while battery storage and PV systems were being embraced by some households and businesses, governments had an obligation to make sure non-solar/battery households were not slugged with the bill.
"While solar PV and battery storage can offer significant benefits to households and the network as a whole, it is important to get the pricing framework right, otherwise some households will be unfairly forced to pick up the tab for other people's choices," Mr Frydenberg said in a speech to the Australian National University's Energy Change Institute in Canberra on Tuesday.
Generous state feed-in tariffs for rooftop solar PV systems over the past decade – where solar households were subsidised to sell energy back into the grid – led to spike in electricity prices as network charges were passed on to non-solar households in the form of higher power bills. This led to state governments closing solar schemes or limiting them to new entrants.
Creating challenges
Mr Frydenberg said while consumers were "hungry" for new and more affordable technologies – such as battery storage or "neighbour to neighbour trading" – they were changing the way the NEM operated.
"This is creating challenges for fairly sharing the costs of supplying electricity," he said.
Mr Frydenberg said the state-wide black out in South Australian in September showed the challenges facing the NEM and the need to ensure the move towards renewables did not affect energy security.
While other countries around the world also faced the move from fossil fuels to lower emissions technologies, Australia's geographic isolation made it even more challenging, he said.
Other countries such as Germany, where wind and solar accounted for 20 per cent of the nation's energy needs, could tap into the wider European grid when the intermittent power was not operating at full capacity.
"This allows them to overcome some of the security and reliability challenges arising from a higher mix of intermittent renewables in the electricity system," Mr Frydenberg said.
Energy security
"Where Germany has far more options to manage its electricity supply through a wider European grid, the NEM is isolated. In Australia the challenge of balancing differing loads from the integration of intermittent renewable generation has to be managed much more closely and with fewer options."
The Finkel review into energy security, chaired by chief scientist Alan Finkel, is looking into how non-synchronous generation such as wind and solar can provide stable electricity supply, including the 50 hertz required for proper frequency, in the NEM.
A preliminary report from the Finkel review will be delivered to next week's COAG meeting, with the final report due in the first half of 2017.
Read more: http://www.afr.com/news/politics/josh-frydenberg-on-who-will-pick-up-the-battery-storage-tab-20161129-gszvgu#ixzz4ROM6w0Yi
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- Solar Energy Battery Storage Wholesale Supplies
Tuesday, November 29, 2016
Battery Storage Sector May Be In Early Stages Of Mass-Market Uptake In Australia
A community-based program to encourage
the uptake of solar and battery storage in Australian homes and
businesses has been so successful that the promoters believe the battery
storage sector may be in the early stages of mass-market uptake.
A
bulk-buy campaign led by Suncrowd has attracted thousands of people at
roadshows in regional towns in New South Wales in the last few months,
and translated into what its organizers believe might already be the
largest coordinated community energy project Australia.
So far, five community groups working
with the program have attracted 3,500 people to events
in Newcastle, Wollongong, the Blue Mountains, Shoalhaven, Goulburn and
the Southern Highlands, delivering a projected 700 kW of solar and 1.5
MWh of battery storage.
Another 500 people turned up at a second
meeting in Wollongong on Tuesday night and similar numbers are expected
in the Blue Mountains tonight.
Suncrowd’s Chris Cooper says the
response has been so strong that it shows that people are clearly ready
for the next stage of the energy transition – by adding affordable
energy storage and smart energy software to their solar system. It may
even signal the start of the early “mass market” uptake of the
technology.
Suncrowd describes itself as a social enterprise “creating a movement
of Australian households who want to take the power back into their own
hands.”
It says its community bulk buy program, which makes solar and batteries easy, accessible and at lower prices – overcomes the complexity and lack of trust that can dog such transactions.
“People want it delivered in a transparent, engaging and easy to understand format,” Cooper says, “and the community sector has a key role in facilitating this if we’re to increase uptake of important new energy technologies”
It says its community bulk buy program, which makes solar and batteries easy, accessible and at lower prices – overcomes the complexity and lack of trust that can dog such transactions.
“People want it delivered in a transparent, engaging and easy to understand format,” Cooper says, “and the community sector has a key role in facilitating this if we’re to increase uptake of important new energy technologies”
Incumbent utilities should be worried.
Firstly, they have long assumed that the uptake of battery storage would
be a slow burn, and wouldn’t take off – apart from a few early adopters
– until the “economics make sense.” When the economics do make sense,
the big retailers assume that most consumers will go to a recognised
name.
But Suncrowd’s Chris Cooper says many
consumers aren’t waiting for the numbers to add up, or for the big names
to get their act together. In New South Wales, this is being driven by
frustration with renewable energy policy and the fact that the “60
cent-ers”, the 140,000 households on the solar bonus scheme, are about
to lose their premium tariffs.
Community energy programs are also gaining traction. The “Repower” program that
funds solar installations on local businesses has now raised nearly
$500,000 for more than 300kW of rooftop solar, including a $140,000 fund
raising that was met in less than 48 hours his week.
In Byron Bay, the community-owned renewable energy retailer Enova is also gaining traction, attracting more than 1,000 customers in its first few months of operation.
And there is growing interest in
programs and technology that encourages households to share their solar
output with other consumers, particularly those who do not have access
to solar. This is despite fierce resistance from fossil fuel incumbents
and barriers erected by regulators.
Even more worrying for utilities is that
the economics of battery storage are close, very close. Bruce Mountain,
from advisory firm CME, says the effective halving of costs in the second version of the Tesla Powerwall has made solar and storage cheaper than grid-supplied electricity in places like South Australia.
In fact, Mountain says the combination of solar and storage is now 25% cheaper than the best retail offer in that state.
Cooper says that is not quite the case
in NSW. Yet. “We are totally open about that – when you are just
looking at bill savings, it is now making pure economic sense in certain
household situations but not all.
“But what makes it still a rational
decision,” he says, “is that many people are motivated by other
“intrinsic” values – including energy independence, their support for
clean energy, and their dislike of incumbent utilities.”
Suncrowd’s July campaign in Newcastle in
partnership with Climate Action Newcastle was Australia’s first
bulk-buy for energy storage, and had almost 200 participants adopting
250kW of solar and 660kWh of storage.
Cooper says the whole program has underlined some key highlights:
- People want batteries: Some 75% of participants have opted for battery storage
- People want smart energy software: Some 70% of eligible customers have opted to add Reposit Power to their battery system
- People want Australian made: Some 80% of customers have paid a premium for Australian made and Adelaide based Tindo Solar panels over a Chinese module (the normal ratio of solar modules in Australia is 80% Chinese made, although many consumers are under the impression that they are buying Australian).
Cooper also notes that the release of
the Tesla Powerwall 2 has eliminated interest in the LG 10 kWh battery,
and is neck-and-neck with the LG Chem 6.5 kWh as the most popular
storage offering.
Suncrowd has also developed some tools of its own, such as an online calculator, which
assists households determine energy independence and bill
savings. Since June, their programs have generated $50,000 income for
community non-profit partners who assist in delivering the programs
across NSW.
Change market rules, and battery storage will easily beat gas
As federal energy minister Josh Frydenberg raised eyebrows for downplaying renewables and talking up gas at a conference in Canberra, a new report has highlighted how a change in energy market rules could encourage more battery and other storage devices and help reduce wholesale energy prices.
Frydenberg was heckled during a speech at the ANU Energy Change Institute for saying that more gas was needed to cope with the rise of “intermittent” wind and solar and help keep Australia’s energy system “secure, reliable and affordable.”
The comments follow an opinion piece Frydenberg authored in the Murdoch media on Monday, when he described the Labor Party’s 50 per cent renewable energy target for 2030 as a “lurch to the left” that already caused the “loss of jobs, less investment and higher electricity prices.” (Even though said policy has not been introduced).
Energy experts point out that Australia’s high electricity prices and the experience in South Australia show that Australia has so far failed in providing secure and affordable electricity.
But while the Coalition and the fossil fuel lobby has tried to use the blackout in South Australia as an excuse to go slow on renewables and abolish state-based targets, others are pushing for a rethink about the electricity market rules and operations so the grid can embrace 21st technology and practices.
One of the key issues is the current system of settlement periods in the wholesale electricity market. Generation is dispatched and priced every 5 minutes, but the market is only “settled” every 30 minutes.
The Australian Energy Regulator and large energy users have argued that this distorts the energy market, allowing for the market to be “gamed” by fossil fuel generators, who might push the price to the market cap for one five minute period, knowing that the benefits will flow.
There have been numerous examples of this “gaming” of the system in both South Australia and Queensland, where the markets rely heavily on gas for the marginal price of generation, and which have the fewest competitors.
Proponents for the rule change argue that if the price was settled every 5 minutes, then the distortions will be removed and fast-reponse technologies such as battery storage could be encouraged, leading to a smarter, cleaner and more secure grid.
This argument has been underpinned by a new study by the Melbourne Energy Institute’s Dylan McConnell, who argues that a 5 minute settlement period is critical to unlock the “full value” of battery and other storage, and will reduce the cost of “caps contracts” by around one third.
One of the criticisms of the 30 minute settlement periods, apart from the gaming, is that it is designed to advantage slow-response peaking gas plants, but does not favour instant-response technologies such as battery storage.
McConnell’s analysis and modelling shows that with a 5-minute settlement period, the potential revenue for battery storage installations could rise more than five-fold to around $617/hour for every kW of capacity, and twice that much on days of high volatility.
This would provide the revenue certainty to encourage battery storage installations to be built. Battery storage could also provide other network security services that could help keep the lights on if grids such as South Australia’s were battered by another super-storm with winds of up to 260km/h.
McConnell’s analysis also looks at the impact of “cap contracts”, a favoured hedging tool used in wholesale markets.
Basically, retailers agree to pay peaking generators a “fixed fee” – of say $10/MWh (in NSW and Victoria, or up to $45/MWh in South Australia) for every trading interval for the year – in return for being “reimbursed” for sharp price spikes (above $300/MWh).
Those cap contracts are the currency that keeps the peaking plants in business, and McConnell says battery storage will need the same. But even though the technology is comparable now to peaking gas plants, under the 30-minute pricing system it would not be able to provide a discount.
Under the 5-minute settlement rule, however, and with battery storage, McConnell’s modelling shows that cap contract pricing could fall by up to 30 per cent. That will have benefits to wholesale prices that will flow through to all consumers.
Fossil fuel generators, particularly those such as ERM and Snowy Hydro who have made recent investments in peaking power plants, have argued strongly against the 5-minute proposal, saying that it could put their units out of business.
The Australian Energy Market Commission, which must decide on the rule change, had been thought ready to ditch the idea. But strong lobbying, and a push by COAG energy ministers for the AEMC to “catch up” with the dramatic technology changes taking place around it, saw it put the matter back on the agenda.
The AEMC is due to conduct a workshop on the issue later this week, and will make a decision next year. Energy users and technology developers say it is one of a number of rulings that are essential if Australia is to push ahead with renewables and not find itself relying on expensive, dirty and slow-responding gas generation.
Frydenberg was heckled during a speech at the ANU Energy Change Institute for saying that more gas was needed to cope with the rise of “intermittent” wind and solar and help keep Australia’s energy system “secure, reliable and affordable.”
The comments follow an opinion piece Frydenberg authored in the Murdoch media on Monday, when he described the Labor Party’s 50 per cent renewable energy target for 2030 as a “lurch to the left” that already caused the “loss of jobs, less investment and higher electricity prices.” (Even though said policy has not been introduced).
Energy experts point out that Australia’s high electricity prices and the experience in South Australia show that Australia has so far failed in providing secure and affordable electricity.
But while the Coalition and the fossil fuel lobby has tried to use the blackout in South Australia as an excuse to go slow on renewables and abolish state-based targets, others are pushing for a rethink about the electricity market rules and operations so the grid can embrace 21st technology and practices.
One of the key issues is the current system of settlement periods in the wholesale electricity market. Generation is dispatched and priced every 5 minutes, but the market is only “settled” every 30 minutes.
The Australian Energy Regulator and large energy users have argued that this distorts the energy market, allowing for the market to be “gamed” by fossil fuel generators, who might push the price to the market cap for one five minute period, knowing that the benefits will flow.
There have been numerous examples of this “gaming” of the system in both South Australia and Queensland, where the markets rely heavily on gas for the marginal price of generation, and which have the fewest competitors.
Proponents for the rule change argue that if the price was settled every 5 minutes, then the distortions will be removed and fast-reponse technologies such as battery storage could be encouraged, leading to a smarter, cleaner and more secure grid.
This argument has been underpinned by a new study by the Melbourne Energy Institute’s Dylan McConnell, who argues that a 5 minute settlement period is critical to unlock the “full value” of battery and other storage, and will reduce the cost of “caps contracts” by around one third.
One of the criticisms of the 30 minute settlement periods, apart from the gaming, is that it is designed to advantage slow-response peaking gas plants, but does not favour instant-response technologies such as battery storage.
McConnell’s analysis and modelling shows that with a 5-minute settlement period, the potential revenue for battery storage installations could rise more than five-fold to around $617/hour for every kW of capacity, and twice that much on days of high volatility.
This would provide the revenue certainty to encourage battery storage installations to be built. Battery storage could also provide other network security services that could help keep the lights on if grids such as South Australia’s were battered by another super-storm with winds of up to 260km/h.
McConnell’s analysis also looks at the impact of “cap contracts”, a favoured hedging tool used in wholesale markets.
Basically, retailers agree to pay peaking generators a “fixed fee” – of say $10/MWh (in NSW and Victoria, or up to $45/MWh in South Australia) for every trading interval for the year – in return for being “reimbursed” for sharp price spikes (above $300/MWh).
Those cap contracts are the currency that keeps the peaking plants in business, and McConnell says battery storage will need the same. But even though the technology is comparable now to peaking gas plants, under the 30-minute pricing system it would not be able to provide a discount.
Under the 5-minute settlement rule, however, and with battery storage, McConnell’s modelling shows that cap contract pricing could fall by up to 30 per cent. That will have benefits to wholesale prices that will flow through to all consumers.
Fossil fuel generators, particularly those such as ERM and Snowy Hydro who have made recent investments in peaking power plants, have argued strongly against the 5-minute proposal, saying that it could put their units out of business.
The Australian Energy Market Commission, which must decide on the rule change, had been thought ready to ditch the idea. But strong lobbying, and a push by COAG energy ministers for the AEMC to “catch up” with the dramatic technology changes taking place around it, saw it put the matter back on the agenda.
The AEMC is due to conduct a workshop on the issue later this week, and will make a decision next year. Energy users and technology developers say it is one of a number of rulings that are essential if Australia is to push ahead with renewables and not find itself relying on expensive, dirty and slow-responding gas generation.
Australian home solar storage battery to take on electronics giant Tesla
With the number of depleted home solar batteries being thrown away tipped to rise over the coming years, one Australian company is taking on electronic giants such as Tesla and Panasonic with the launch of an easily recyclable power source.
About 8,000 tonnes of lithium-ion batteries are thrown away every year and in the next 20 years that is expected to jump to 150,000 tonnes, partly due to a rise in the use of big home solar batteries, according to the Australian Battery Recycling Initiative.
Brisbane company Redflow says it has developed the ZCell battery that, unlike its competitors, does not use lithium and is more recyclable than its competitors.
"The active parts are plastic, aluminium and steel, the fluid electrolyte can be removed and cleaned and put in the next battery so the whole thing is very recyclable," executive chairman Simon Hackett said.
The battery is designed to store 10kWh of electricity — enough to keep most homes running for a day or two.
"It's a very effective high capacity battery. It's about the size of a bar-fridge on its side and it goes outside an external wall of your house."
With the end of generous government rebates for power being fed back into grid, the demand for home batteries has soared.
Some 1.5 million homes have solar panels installed and, because of that, international heavyweights like LG and Enphase have launched various battery models in Australia this year.
In NSW, generous premiums paid to homeowners for exporting their solar electricity to the grid are set to expire at the end of the year.
More than 146,000 households are about to see their feed-in tariff drop from as high as 60c/kWh to just under 5c/kWh.
Call for recycling regulations as battery uptake increases
But with a growing battery uptake, is there a future problem in the making?
Helen Lewis, Australian Battery Recycling Initiative chief executive, said most batteries being sold have a life span of 10 years and is calling for the Government to accelerate negotiations with the industry for a battery recycling scheme.
"We don't have any regulations that require recycling of batteries at the moment. We'd like to see that come into force sometime over the next few years."
Dr Lewis warned that it took almost 10 years to install a TV recycling program.
"We certainly don't want to see batteries sitting on the kerb like we saw for TVs and computers a few years ago," she said.
However another enterprising company in Victoria has seen a market opportunity.
PF Metals has just opened a pilot lithium-ion battery recycling plant.
The machine crunches down mobile phone and laptop batteries to their component parts and sells them to be remade into batteries.
"That lithium-ion dust can go back into manufacturing new energy systems and that's why we're quite excited about the process because we're creating something that can go back into all-new products," the firm said.
The chemistry of many large household batteries is similar to smaller batteries.
So managing director Andrew Mackenzie is aiming to scale his facility up to handle the larger batteries.
Redflow announced its new battery to the ASX this morning.
About 8,000 tonnes of lithium-ion batteries are thrown away every year and in the next 20 years that is expected to jump to 150,000 tonnes, partly due to a rise in the use of big home solar batteries, according to the Australian Battery Recycling Initiative.
Brisbane company Redflow says it has developed the ZCell battery that, unlike its competitors, does not use lithium and is more recyclable than its competitors.
"The active parts are plastic, aluminium and steel, the fluid electrolyte can be removed and cleaned and put in the next battery so the whole thing is very recyclable," executive chairman Simon Hackett said.
The battery is designed to store 10kWh of electricity — enough to keep most homes running for a day or two.
"It's a very effective high capacity battery. It's about the size of a bar-fridge on its side and it goes outside an external wall of your house."
With the end of generous government rebates for power being fed back into grid, the demand for home batteries has soared.
Some 1.5 million homes have solar panels installed and, because of that, international heavyweights like LG and Enphase have launched various battery models in Australia this year.
In NSW, generous premiums paid to homeowners for exporting their solar electricity to the grid are set to expire at the end of the year.
More than 146,000 households are about to see their feed-in tariff drop from as high as 60c/kWh to just under 5c/kWh.
Call for recycling regulations as battery uptake increases
But with a growing battery uptake, is there a future problem in the making?
Helen Lewis, Australian Battery Recycling Initiative chief executive, said most batteries being sold have a life span of 10 years and is calling for the Government to accelerate negotiations with the industry for a battery recycling scheme.
"We don't have any regulations that require recycling of batteries at the moment. We'd like to see that come into force sometime over the next few years."
Dr Lewis warned that it took almost 10 years to install a TV recycling program.
"We certainly don't want to see batteries sitting on the kerb like we saw for TVs and computers a few years ago," she said.
However another enterprising company in Victoria has seen a market opportunity.
PF Metals has just opened a pilot lithium-ion battery recycling plant.
The machine crunches down mobile phone and laptop batteries to their component parts and sells them to be remade into batteries.
"That lithium-ion dust can go back into manufacturing new energy systems and that's why we're quite excited about the process because we're creating something that can go back into all-new products," the firm said.
The chemistry of many large household batteries is similar to smaller batteries.
So managing director Andrew Mackenzie is aiming to scale his facility up to handle the larger batteries.
Redflow announced its new battery to the ASX this morning.
New York City Sets the First Citywide Solar Storage Battery Target
Only two U.S. states, California and Massachusetts, have set targets for energy storage deployments. Now New York City has joined them.
The city government unveiled a storage goal of 100 megawatt-hours by 2020 last week, along with an expanded solar target of 1,000 megawatts by 2030. Storage, with its capacity to integrate variable wind and solar power sources into the grid, is expected to play a critical role in meeting the city's plans to cut greenhouse gases by 80 percent by 2050.
Storage experts told GTM that this is the first time a city has set such a target.
The city's target is not a legally binding requirement like California's. It's more of an aspirational target with policies designed to make the process easier.
"With a city-based target, they are also directly responsible for building codes and siting regulations, deployment strategies and even local taxes -- and the city can also take steps to adapt all these rules and regulations to accelerate deployment," wrote Matt Roberts, executive director of the Energy Storage Association, in an email. "The city is able to marshal its forces toward this collective goal, and can more easily adjust the goal based on the observed value delivered in the future."
The New York City target applies to the full spectrum of storage, including electrochemical and thermal technologies. City officials are targeting storage as a way to reduce demand charges, defer distribution system upgrades, pre-cool buildings and shift solar power consumption.
For all the potential use cases, energy storage is still a bit player in the city's energy system. A major motivation for the storage target is to make permitting easier, said Daniel Zarrilli, senior director of climate policy and programs with the city.
Currently, getting a storage system approved is "largely a one-off process where it's pulled out of a queue and dealt with specifically because it’s unique," he said. "We don’t want people thinking, ‘Oh, I want to put in storage, but it may be too hard.'"
That's how solar permitting was in the early days, but then the city set a target in 2014 to get 100 megawatts of public solar and 250 megawatts of private solar by 2025. This spurred an increase in deployments and a streamlining of the city's procedures.
"We’ve been using that target as a way to knock down some of the internal bureaucratic hurdles," Zarrilli said. The hope is something similar will happen with storage.
Energy storage makes a lot of sense for New York City, said Daniel Finn-Foley, a senior analyst for energy storage at GTM Research.
"It's easy to forget that Manhattan is an island, with all the associated complications, but you'd be reminded if you ever tried to plan transmission systems into the city," he said. "Its capacity prices are quite high -- the latest strip auction for the NYISO capacity market cleared at $10.99/kW-month, compared to $3.62 across much of the rest of the state."
Most recent growth in storage capacity nationwide has been driven by cheaper lithium-ion batteries, but the New York City Fire Department and the Department of Buildings are still figuring out the safety implications of this new technology. Lithium-ion chemistries carry some degree of risk for fires, and the city wants to feel secure before adding them into the highly dense region.
A block on lithium-ion would force developers to focus on other technologies, which might not be the cheapest or most efficient for a particular use case. The city has plenty of other options to work with though. The Metropolitan Transit Authority, for instance, is trying out a 400-kilowatt-hour vanadium redox flow battery in downtown Manhattan. That technology is known for its safe components and long-duration performance.
GTM wasn't able to find a tally of storage deployments in the city so far, but GTM Research forecasts the state of New York will have an annual market of 273 megawatt-hours in 2020. So if a strong share of the state's deployments go to its largest city, the 100-megawatt-hour target should be doable.
The city government unveiled a storage goal of 100 megawatt-hours by 2020 last week, along with an expanded solar target of 1,000 megawatts by 2030. Storage, with its capacity to integrate variable wind and solar power sources into the grid, is expected to play a critical role in meeting the city's plans to cut greenhouse gases by 80 percent by 2050.
Storage experts told GTM that this is the first time a city has set such a target.
The city's target is not a legally binding requirement like California's. It's more of an aspirational target with policies designed to make the process easier.
"With a city-based target, they are also directly responsible for building codes and siting regulations, deployment strategies and even local taxes -- and the city can also take steps to adapt all these rules and regulations to accelerate deployment," wrote Matt Roberts, executive director of the Energy Storage Association, in an email. "The city is able to marshal its forces toward this collective goal, and can more easily adjust the goal based on the observed value delivered in the future."
The New York City target applies to the full spectrum of storage, including electrochemical and thermal technologies. City officials are targeting storage as a way to reduce demand charges, defer distribution system upgrades, pre-cool buildings and shift solar power consumption.
For all the potential use cases, energy storage is still a bit player in the city's energy system. A major motivation for the storage target is to make permitting easier, said Daniel Zarrilli, senior director of climate policy and programs with the city.
Currently, getting a storage system approved is "largely a one-off process where it's pulled out of a queue and dealt with specifically because it’s unique," he said. "We don’t want people thinking, ‘Oh, I want to put in storage, but it may be too hard.'"
That's how solar permitting was in the early days, but then the city set a target in 2014 to get 100 megawatts of public solar and 250 megawatts of private solar by 2025. This spurred an increase in deployments and a streamlining of the city's procedures.
"We’ve been using that target as a way to knock down some of the internal bureaucratic hurdles," Zarrilli said. The hope is something similar will happen with storage.
Energy storage makes a lot of sense for New York City, said Daniel Finn-Foley, a senior analyst for energy storage at GTM Research.
"It's easy to forget that Manhattan is an island, with all the associated complications, but you'd be reminded if you ever tried to plan transmission systems into the city," he said. "Its capacity prices are quite high -- the latest strip auction for the NYISO capacity market cleared at $10.99/kW-month, compared to $3.62 across much of the rest of the state."
Most recent growth in storage capacity nationwide has been driven by cheaper lithium-ion batteries, but the New York City Fire Department and the Department of Buildings are still figuring out the safety implications of this new technology. Lithium-ion chemistries carry some degree of risk for fires, and the city wants to feel secure before adding them into the highly dense region.
A block on lithium-ion would force developers to focus on other technologies, which might not be the cheapest or most efficient for a particular use case. The city has plenty of other options to work with though. The Metropolitan Transit Authority, for instance, is trying out a 400-kilowatt-hour vanadium redox flow battery in downtown Manhattan. That technology is known for its safe components and long-duration performance.
GTM wasn't able to find a tally of storage deployments in the city so far, but GTM Research forecasts the state of New York will have an annual market of 273 megawatt-hours in 2020. So if a strong share of the state's deployments go to its largest city, the 100-megawatt-hour target should be doable.
Thursday, November 24, 2016
Wholesale LifePo4 Battery Storage take-up in Australia to Snowball Forward
A NSW-based community solar and battery storage bulk buy program has been so successful that the promoters believe the battery storage sector may be in the early stages of mass-market uptake.
The campaign, led by Suncrowd, has attracted thousands of people at roadshows in regional towns in New South Wales in the last few months, and translated into what its organisers believe might already be the largest coordinated community energy project Australia.
Suncrowd’s Chris Cooper says the response has been so strong that it shows that people are clearly ready for the next stage of the energy transition – by adding affordable energy storage and smart energy software to their solar system. It may even signal the start of the early “mass market” uptake of the technology.
Cooper says Suncrowd’s community bulk buy program, which makes solar and batteries easy, accessible and at lower prices, overcomes the complexity and lack of trust that can dog such transactions.
“People want it delivered in a transparent, engaging and easy to understand format,” Cooper says, “and the community sector has a key role in facilitating this if we’re to increase uptake of important new energy technologies”
Incumbent utilities should be worried. Firstly, they have long assumed that the uptake of battery storage would be a slow burn, and wouldn’t take off – apart from a few early adopters – until the “economics make sense.” When the economics do make sense, the big retailers assume that most consumers will go to a recognised name.
But Cooper says many consumers aren’t waiting for the numbers to add up, or for the big names to get their act together. In New South Wales, this is being driven by frustration with renewable energy policy and the fact that the “60 cent-ers”, the 140,000 households on the solar bonus scheme, are about to lose their premium tariffs.
“When you are just looking at bill savings, it is now making pure economic sense in certain household situations but not all,” Cooper said.
“But what makes it still a rational decision is that many people are motivated by other “intrinsic” values – including energy independence, their support for clean energy, and their dislike of incumbent utilities.”
The campaign, led by Suncrowd, has attracted thousands of people at roadshows in regional towns in New South Wales in the last few months, and translated into what its organisers believe might already be the largest coordinated community energy project Australia.
Suncrowd’s Chris Cooper says the response has been so strong that it shows that people are clearly ready for the next stage of the energy transition – by adding affordable energy storage and smart energy software to their solar system. It may even signal the start of the early “mass market” uptake of the technology.
Cooper says Suncrowd’s community bulk buy program, which makes solar and batteries easy, accessible and at lower prices, overcomes the complexity and lack of trust that can dog such transactions.
“People want it delivered in a transparent, engaging and easy to understand format,” Cooper says, “and the community sector has a key role in facilitating this if we’re to increase uptake of important new energy technologies”
Incumbent utilities should be worried. Firstly, they have long assumed that the uptake of battery storage would be a slow burn, and wouldn’t take off – apart from a few early adopters – until the “economics make sense.” When the economics do make sense, the big retailers assume that most consumers will go to a recognised name.
But Cooper says many consumers aren’t waiting for the numbers to add up, or for the big names to get their act together. In New South Wales, this is being driven by frustration with renewable energy policy and the fact that the “60 cent-ers”, the 140,000 households on the solar bonus scheme, are about to lose their premium tariffs.
“When you are just looking at bill savings, it is now making pure economic sense in certain household situations but not all,” Cooper said.
“But what makes it still a rational decision is that many people are motivated by other “intrinsic” values – including energy independence, their support for clean energy, and their dislike of incumbent utilities.”
How Lifepo4 Battery Storage Promises to Fill the Renewable Energy's gap
India is the world’s second most populous country and the seventh largest economy. It is the fastest growing large economy in the world. However, per capita power consumption of the country is still one of the lowest and stands at approximately one-third of the global average. A KPMG report mentions that India’s power demand is going to double by 2020. The government is taking initiatives to increase electricity generation in the country and making it available for all. At present, a lion’s share of the country’s electricity is produced from non-renewable energy sources like coal. As part of its commitment towards clean energy, the present government has planned to install 175 GW of renewable power by 2022 - 100 GW from solar power, 60 GW from wind power, 10 GW from bio power and 5 GW from small hydro power.
However, implementation of such high volume of renewable energy has its own challenges. Sun is available only during the sunny days and wind speed is maximum primarily during the night and during rainy seasons. Both the power sources miss the peak hours i.e., morning and evening. These challenges have sparked a need to store these energies when they are produced in excess and use them later during peak hours. Since renewable energies are available intermittently, it can destabilize the grid when injected in higher quantity. Battery storage is one of the possible solutions to this problem. The battery stores the excess renewable energy and supplies it to the grid when it is needed. This balances the grid supply, makes the power supply smoother and more predictable.
IESA has estimated that over 70 GW and 200 GWh of Energy Storage opportunity in India by 2022, which is one of the highest in the world.Out of 70 GW, over 35 GW of demand is expected from newer applications like wind and solar integration, frequency regulation, peak management, T&D deferral, dieselusage optimization andelectric vehicles.
While the merit of the storage technology has been accepted by one and all in the industry, the biggest challenge in its adoption has remain the technology cost. Inclusion of battery storage within the scope of a utility scale project my increase its cost by 40%. For off-grid roof top projects, where small capacity battery is used, at present a 12 Volt, 150 amp-hr lead acid battery costs approx. Rs. 14,000 with 5 years warranty. If we consider life of a lead acid battery is 5 yrs., this translates to storage cost of Rs. 6 / Unit. So the effective per unit electricity cost goes well above Rs. 10 / unit. However, the solar battery storage technology is at its infancy. Research is going on at full swing to produce economical grid scale batteries. Besides, with higher usage, manufacturers will reach economies of scale and price will automatically come down over next 4 – 5 years as it has happened in the LED market.
Initiatives have been taken in the past to promote battery storage technology. Many of them are notable. First, SECI is seeking bids for a 750-megawatt solar park at Ananthapuramu in Andhra Pradesh. SECI is looking to procure 100 megawatts of storage capacity. Second, IL&FS, also one of the biggest independent wind power producers in India, last year secured funding from the United States Trade and Development Agency (USTDA) to look into utility-scale integration of wind, solar and storage in India. Third, Tesla Motor’s new product “Powerwall”, a rechargeable lithium-ion battery for residential/electric vehicles applications is an advanced wall-mounted home battery that provides 10 kWh of storage, storing solar energy and allowing customers to cache grid electricity from non-peak periods to use during peak times.
Fourth, Panasonic India Pvt. Ltd. and AES India Private Limited announced an agreement to construct a 10 MW energy storage array at Panasonic’s Technopark manufacturing facility in Jhajjar, Haryana. And finally, all major solar power developers have already used storage solutions in some of their installations.
It is clear that battery storage will provide sustainability to the renewable energy sector in coming years. The opportunity is huge in India, mainly in the rooftop/off-grid space. For utility scale projects, storage will provide necessary grid balancing and grid stabilization solution. It will be interesting to see how the technology unfolds globally and especially in a big renewable market like India.
However, implementation of such high volume of renewable energy has its own challenges. Sun is available only during the sunny days and wind speed is maximum primarily during the night and during rainy seasons. Both the power sources miss the peak hours i.e., morning and evening. These challenges have sparked a need to store these energies when they are produced in excess and use them later during peak hours. Since renewable energies are available intermittently, it can destabilize the grid when injected in higher quantity. Battery storage is one of the possible solutions to this problem. The battery stores the excess renewable energy and supplies it to the grid when it is needed. This balances the grid supply, makes the power supply smoother and more predictable.
IESA has estimated that over 70 GW and 200 GWh of Energy Storage opportunity in India by 2022, which is one of the highest in the world.Out of 70 GW, over 35 GW of demand is expected from newer applications like wind and solar integration, frequency regulation, peak management, T&D deferral, dieselusage optimization andelectric vehicles.
While the merit of the storage technology has been accepted by one and all in the industry, the biggest challenge in its adoption has remain the technology cost. Inclusion of battery storage within the scope of a utility scale project my increase its cost by 40%. For off-grid roof top projects, where small capacity battery is used, at present a 12 Volt, 150 amp-hr lead acid battery costs approx. Rs. 14,000 with 5 years warranty. If we consider life of a lead acid battery is 5 yrs., this translates to storage cost of Rs. 6 / Unit. So the effective per unit electricity cost goes well above Rs. 10 / unit. However, the solar battery storage technology is at its infancy. Research is going on at full swing to produce economical grid scale batteries. Besides, with higher usage, manufacturers will reach economies of scale and price will automatically come down over next 4 – 5 years as it has happened in the LED market.
Initiatives have been taken in the past to promote battery storage technology. Many of them are notable. First, SECI is seeking bids for a 750-megawatt solar park at Ananthapuramu in Andhra Pradesh. SECI is looking to procure 100 megawatts of storage capacity. Second, IL&FS, also one of the biggest independent wind power producers in India, last year secured funding from the United States Trade and Development Agency (USTDA) to look into utility-scale integration of wind, solar and storage in India. Third, Tesla Motor’s new product “Powerwall”, a rechargeable lithium-ion battery for residential/electric vehicles applications is an advanced wall-mounted home battery that provides 10 kWh of storage, storing solar energy and allowing customers to cache grid electricity from non-peak periods to use during peak times.
Fourth, Panasonic India Pvt. Ltd. and AES India Private Limited announced an agreement to construct a 10 MW energy storage array at Panasonic’s Technopark manufacturing facility in Jhajjar, Haryana. And finally, all major solar power developers have already used storage solutions in some of their installations.It is clear that battery storage will provide sustainability to the renewable energy sector in coming years. The opportunity is huge in India, mainly in the rooftop/off-grid space. For utility scale projects, storage will provide necessary grid balancing and grid stabilization solution. It will be interesting to see how the technology unfolds globally and especially in a big renewable market like India.
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