US community solar and storage provider Nexamp is providing a co-located facility as a non-wires alternative to a substation in New York state.

The Watertown Renewables at the Coffeen substation in Watertown project pairs an 8.4MW solar PV array with a 31MWh battery energy storage system. The BESS is made up of 10 Tesla Megapack units, the EV giant’s utility-scale product.

The substation is run by the US subsidiary of the UK’s National Grid and the project will eliminate the need for additional transmission lines or substation upgrades. The project has been engineered to allow National Grid to call on the system for up to 5.7MW/29MWh up to 25 times per year, either from the BESS or the solar PV.

The project will also serve local residents through Nexamp’s community solar programme, allowing them to save on energy bills while delivering renewable energy to the grid. It is expected to be completed early next year.

“This project is significant because it represents a number of important firsts,” explained Chris Clark, chief development officer, Nexamp. “It is our first NWA (non-wires alternative) project and is the result of a lot of hard work and collaboration between Nexamp and National Grid.”

The company said it has dozens of other solar and storage projects in operation across the Northeast and elsewhere in the US. It recently completed two energy storage projects co-located with existing solar PV in Massachusetts, as reported by Energy-Storage.news.

Energy-Storage.news also recently interviewed the company’s VP for energy storage, Mark Frigo.