Ampt, a company providing DC optimizers for large-scale photovoltaic (PV) systems, is working with Edison Power Co. Ltd. to integrate Ampt String Optimizers into a solar+storage microgrid project being developed by Tocoo Inc. for the utility Okinawa Electric Power Company in Miyakojima, Japan. The project supports Miyako Island’s goal to source 55% of the region’s electricity from renewable energy by 2030.

Edison Power is using Ampt technology to enable DC-coupled architecture, which marks the first project of this kind for the utility. Ampt String Optimizers provide the critical link between the PV array, battery system and inverter to manage intermittency, control frequency and achieve 2% or less power fluctuation of rated output per minute, as required by the Okinawa Power Company and local legislation.

Edison Power is deploying Ampt String Optimizers with lithium-iron-phosphate batteries from Gotion and string inverters from Huawei. The microgrid system consists of 1,200 kWp of solar linked through optimizers to 1,700 kWh of batteries and 700 kW of inverters.

Ampt String Optimizers are DC/DC converters that perform maximum power point tracking (MPPT) on each string of PV modules to increase the lifetime performance of the system. They are also inverter and battery-technology independent.

“We were seeking a power solution that meets our high standards for system responsiveness and performance, and we were impressed with Ampt’s expertise and global footprint of successful DC-coupled installations,” says Mr. Nakamura, general manager of Edison Power’s storage battery business. “With Ampt String Optimizers, we are able to significantly improve round-trip energy efficiency while saving on capital costs compared to other solutions.”

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Solar Alliance Energy Inc., a solar energy solutions provider focused on the commercial and industrial solar sector, has signed contracts for the design, engineering and construction of two commercial solar projects for a client in Tennessee.

The first is a ground-mount system with a capacity of 250 kW and a capital cost of $720,000. The second is a ground-mount system with a capacity of 299 kW and a capital cost of $860,000. The two facilities, which will be built at separate locations, are scheduled to begin construction in the third quarter of 2023 and are currently targeted for completion in the first quarter of 2024.

“These projects are the latest for Solar Alliance in Tennessee as we build out our project backlog into 2024,” says CEO Myke Clark. “The demand we are seeing for commercial and industrial solar is intensifying as the financial and environmental benefits of solar are becoming clearer to business owners.”

The two Solar Alliance ventures contribute to a backlog of contracted projects in Tennessee that now totals $6.1 million, including the following previously announced contracts:

A 565 kW commercial solar facility for a manufacturing client: The project, with a $1.47 million capital cost, is scheduled to begin construction in the third quarter of 2023 and is currently targeted for completion by the end of 2023.

An 872 kW solar project announced in February of this year, with a $1.8 million capital cost. Design and engineering on the project began in the second quarter of 2023. Completion is targeted for the end of 2023.

“The economic basis for businesses to make the switch to solar is more compelling than ever and we are increasingly confident in the road ahead,” concludes Clark.

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Castillo Engineering, a firm based in Maitland, Fla., and RPG Energy Group, an energy efficiency and renewable energy integrator headquartered in Indianapolis, recently joined forces and completed a 1.3 MW behind-the-meter solar project in Indiana, the last net metered project in the state.

Located in Greenwood, Ind., the project utilizes bifacial solar panels and ballasted racking, and will provide operational savings of $140,000 for Endress+Hauser, an automation and instrumentation manufacturing company, during the first year alone.

Providing solar energy customers with savings through site optimization is more important than ever in Indiana, which recently phased out net metering. Since 2004, the Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission had required the state’s five investor-owned utility companies to offer net metering to all electric customers. The policy allowed those customers to sell their excess energy back to utilities at the same rate utilities charged customers for electricity. However, a bill approved by state legislators in 2017 began to phase out net metering, with the official end date taking place recently. As a result, what customers could have earned for selling solar power back to the grid dropped by around 70%.

RPG Energy Group and Castillo Engineering collaborated to meet the necessary deadlines – both regulatory and operational – to enable this 1.3 MW solar project to be grandfathered in for retail net metering. In order to meet the net metering deadlines, the companies had to submit the interconnection application and receive approvals within six months of project completion.

In addition to meeting the strict deadlines to enable this customer to have its solar system grandfathered in to receive retail net metering, the project also resulted in 53% net energy offset of the plant. The instrumentation manufacturer, which produces flow meters for liquid, gas and steam systems, can now offset the production of thousands of flow meters per year as a result of this solar energy system.

“We are grateful to have had this additional opportunity to work alongside RPG to deliver substantial long-term savings to this business,” says Christopher Castillo, CEO at Castillo Engineering. “RPG’s expertise in industrial-scale, behind-the-meter solar projects was crucial in the success of this project.”

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Pumped hydro projects typically have discharge durations of 6-20 hours, though can go even higher.

In this manner, TC Energy is optimistic that the project can help add flexibility to the Ontarian energy grid, and help meet demand for power when it is at its highest.

TC Energy first proposed the project in 2019, and has been waiting for regulatory approval to begin construction since. The company expects the Ministry of Energy to reach a decision by the end of this year, at which point TC Energy will make a final investment decision next year, and begin construction by the end of 2024, should all proceed as expected.

“Ontario Pumped Storage will be a critical component of Ontario’s growing clean economy and will deliver significant benefits and savings to consumers,” said Corey Hessen, executive vice president of TC energy and president of its power and energy solutions.

“We are pleased the government is advancing efforts to recognise the significant role that long duration storage plays, firming resources will become increasingly valuable in supporting a future emission-free electricity system.”

The company’s announcement comes on the heels of the launch of a new plan, dubbed ‘Powering Ontario’s Growth’ by the provincial government. The plan acknowledges that Ontario will likely have to expand its energy grid in the coming years, with the province’s electricity demand increasing year-on-year for the first time since 2005, and the government estimating that phasing out coal and electrifying the province’s energy grid will increase Ontario’s energy demands by 8TWh, to say nothing of the possible impacts on demand of growth in other sectors.

The Ontario Independent Electricity System Operator agrees with this assessment, noting that the province will need up to 15GW of new electricity production by 2035 in order to meet growing demand for power. TC Energy hopes that its pumped storage project will help improve the flexibility and efficiency of the province’s grid, while meeting the decarbonisation goals set out in the province’s growth plan.

“Ontario has attracted billions of dollars in investments from both domestic and international companies over the last two and a half years,” said Vic Fedeli, Ontario’s minister of economic development, job creation and trade, of the Powering Ontario’s Growth plan. “As our province moves toward an electric future with a strong end-to-end electric vehicle supply chain, there has never been a greater need for clean, affordable energy that companies can rely on. This plan brings us one step closer to being a world-leading energy powerhouse.”

Should it be built and commissioned as expected, the pumped storage project will be TC Energy’s latest energy facility in Canada, following the start of construction work at its solar PV plant in Alberta in October 2022.

Ontario and Alberta are the two leading provinces of Canada for energy storage deployments, as written in a special feature for Vol.35 of PV Tech Power, Solar Media’s quarterly technical journal for the downstream solar industry.

Ontario’s commercial & industrial (C&I) sector has bloomed thanks to high peak demand tariffs incentivising peak shaving battery storage projects, while the grid-scale segment is now starting to kick on with the Ontario Independent Electricity System Operator procuring large-scale projects.

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Ameresco will provide four battery arrays with an output of 11.75MW and four with an output of 7.84MW, distributed across eight different substation sites owned by the cooperative – which serves Colorado’s northern Front Range – and will be sited in Adams, Broomfield and Weld counties.

With these battery assets, United Power will be able to better balance its load effectively during heavy consumption periods as it integrates more renewables into its operations.

Jon Mancini, senior VP of solar project development at Ameresco, said: “The inclusion of this expansive asset in Ameresco’s portfolio further underscores the global need for energy storage to bolster clean and sustainable power sources. Energy storage plays a crucial role in enhancing grid reliability, optimizing renewable energy utilization, and fostering a resilient and efficient energy future.”

The announcement comes less than a week after Ameresco secured another significant battery energy storage system (BESS) supply agreement with independent power producer (IPP) Middle River Power. The system integrator will deploy four BESS projects in California expected to be completed by Q3 of 2024 and with a total capacity of 379MWh.

The state of Colorado is also the site of one of two long-duration, 1GWh projects being deployed by utility Xcel Energy using the proprietary iron-air battery tech from Form Energy, for which the other in Minnesota this week got the regulatory green light.

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‘Transferability’ brings in a new, more flexible way for investors to take advantage of tax credits for clean energy projects, including the investment tax credit (ITC) for standalone energy storage.

Previously, utilising an ITC required setting up a complicated tax equity joint venture (JV) partnership between the project’s developer and the tax equity buyer, normally a large bank. The developer would allocate the tax credits to the buyer in exchange for a cash equity investment by the buyer into the project’s JV to finance its development.

However, these partnerships are complicated and costly meaning only the largest financial institutions could put the work in for them, and smaller clean energy projects may not have been worth the effort involved. The tax equity partnership also meant developers did not initially own their projects and might later need to buy out the tax equity buyer.

The transferability provisions proposed in June would allow developers to simply monetise the tax credits by selling them for cash without the need for complicated JV tax equity structures. The simpler process should open up the pool of potential buyers of the tax credits substantially, since they would in theory not require in-depth knowledge and experience with tax equity transactions.

“Game changer for renewable energy development”

Mona Dajani, global head of Renewables and Energy & Infrastructure for law firm Shearman & Sterling, is adamant about how significant these new rules are.

“This really is a game changer for clean energy development. These new rules will pump a huge infusion of investment into renewable energy projects in the US. It will effectively liberalise and expand the renewable energy project finance pipeline by enabling developers to shop their tax credit among a broader market of prospective tax equity investors,” she said.

“This guidance from the Treasury clarifies which entities will be eligible for each credit and it spells out the process for claiming and receiving a direct pay or transferring credit,” Dajan said.

“By making these credits more transferable, we will be able to address the current limitations in the tax equity market, and it will make it much more easier for a broader array to participate in the clean energy transition.”

The new rules would also allow the sale of a single ITC from a single renewable energy project to multiple different parties on a pro-rata basis, Dajani added.

They also change the way an ITC’s value is calculated. Before, the ITC would be calculated based on the ‘fair market value’ of a project as per its transfer to the tax equity JV partnership, rather than the actual cost to build a project as it panned out. Under the new rules, the ITC’s value would be calculated based on the cost basis of the asset determined by the transferor (the developer selling the tax credits).

As previously written by Energy-Storage.news, new ‘direct pay’ (or ‘elective pay’) provisions will allow tax-exempt institutions to monetise available tax credits by receiving an equivalent cash payment directly from the IRS.

Direct pay will also apply to tax-paying businesses for three specific tax credits: Advanced Manufacturing (45X), Carbon Oxide Sequestration (45Q), and Clean Hydrogen (45V).

So, gigafactories and other manufacturing facilities for clean energy technology can receive direct payments from the government for the products they produce under tax credit 45X. How much it pays for different technologies is spelt out on this page from the US government. Turkish firm Pomega expects nearly US$1 billion from the tax credit over the next decade for its lithium-ion gigafactory in South Carolina.

Dajani agreed this was hugely significant and could “revolutionise manufacturing in the US by really giving it a competitive advantage”.

One thing almost all industry sources Energy-Storage.news has asked about the new ITC for standalone storage have said is that the tax equity community will take time to become comfortable with the technology, which is relatively new compared to wind or solar and typically has less contracted revenue.

The mass of new projects paired with this lack of familiarity – not helped by the collapse of one of the US’ largest tax equity buyers Silicon Valley Bank – could mean an increase in the mismatch between the supply and demand of tax credits for storage, some said.

However, Dajani said that while it’s still early days for standalone there has been a “tremendous uptick” in interest, and her team is working on 15-20 utility-scale tax equity deals for standalone energy storage.

“There’s a lot of interest in the space, from both the traditional tax equity players as well as new players come in. We’ve structured energy storage deals before but they were not regular, however now, they are pretty regular for me and my team.”

Still some grey areas and new transferability registration process

“This guidance is really helpful, a big step in the right direction, though it’s not crystal clear on some parts,” Dajani said.

A significant new development is the formation of a new registration process for clean energy projects as part of transferability. Any project will need to be registered on the portal in order to be transferred, because each project will have a unique registration number, but it’s not yet known when the registration will be fully up and running.

And once it is, it’s not clear how long it will take the IRS to process applications, as it could be administrative in nature of a more fulsome review, she added. Deals being worked on now will need the system up and running before going ahead.

Dajani also spoke about the other major new components of the ITC for clean energy projects which the IRS provided additional information on, the domestic content 10% adder, for an article which we published last week.

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In a statement made by the business, it confirmed that “the market-first hybrid PPA will also provide secure and bankable revenue streams for both the solar farm and storage system”.

This agreement also represents a key aspect of the market within the UK. In order to optimise and increase revenue output of many solar farms, companies are looking to co-location of energy storage. This also helps to boost the flexibility of their assets in the post-subsidy market.

Showcasing this rising popularity, Pexapark highlighted that “45% of all solar planning permissions submitted in the UK in the past two years have been for hybrid systems encompassing storage”.

By providing secure and bankable revenue streams, the DIF hybrid PPA provides a model for the wider market to follow in order to reach scale amid the broader energy transition across GB and the EU, a statement read.

Brian Knowles, director of storage and flexibility at Pexapark, said: “We’d like to congratulate DIF on this pioneering PPA, which marks the first of its kind in the UK and Europe more widely.

“The innovative nature of this agreement reflects our commitment to finding new PPA solutions for unsubsidised renewable energy developers and offtakers, with contracted revenues that offer attractive returns and low risk profiles for investors.”

See the original version of this article on Solar Power Portal.

Challenges as well as opportunities to co-location

Co-locating renewable generation with energy storage presents opportunities but also challenges, particularly around offtake agreements, according to a developer speaking anonymously at-length on the topic to Energy-Storage.news last year, discussing the UK market.

Alongside potential issues around grid connection and structuring the project’s special purpose vehicles (SPVs), optimising the offtake of a hybrid project is complicated, they said. In the case of a shared grid connection, it can mean the traditional utility world of long-term PPAs for renewables rubbing up against the algorithm-based new wave of BESS optimisers.

Our source described the combination of both sides – which seems to be being offered here by Pexapark – as “somewhat rare in the UK market” and that another option would be to have two parties responsible for each portion of the project.

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While the focus on renewable energy is growing, the region’s energy transition is “lagging” when it comes to a corresponding focus on energy storage, fellow speaker Nicholas Marquier, of the International Finance Corporation (IFC) said.

Speaking generally about the 10 countries in the region, Suryadi, manager of power, fossil fuel, alternative energy and energy storage at the intergovernmental organisation which represents their interests, said there is a “lack of involvement in discussion” by regulators.

That lack of involvement is the biggest challenge facing the adoption of energy storage today, because regulators in ASEAN aren’t yet arming themselves with technical knowledge on the benefits of batteries and other storage technologies.

Beni Suryadi referred to the way that Vietnam moved rapidly to deploy several gigawatts of solar PV from 2020 to 2022 is a well-known “legend” of the renewable energy industry. Conversely, industry observers need to “work hard” to find any substantive developments in the country relating to energy storage, he said.

Marquier of the IFC noted that ASEAN countries’ governments recognise that the climate agenda is important, and renewable energy is a critical and key part of that. Yet “there are not so many regulators” looking at storage as part of the solution. There are incentive programmes and support schemes for renewable energy, but not for battery energy storage systems (BESS) and other storage tech.

Suryadi added that incentives are created to enable growth of renewable energy when policies and deployment targets are put in place for solar PV, wind and other clean energy resources.

This hasn’t yet happened for energy storage because in many cases policymakers and regulators aren’t aware of the benefits energy storage can offer, which include helping to lower the cost of running energy systems. Without that awareness, incentives for storage are seen as a cost burden.

This is starting to change, and awareness is growing, but it will take time. Suryadi named the example of Thailand, which recognised some time ago that energy storage could benefit its energy transition and bolster energy security, access and reliability, but creating the right regulations and support to enable that is still a “massive challenge,” the expert said.

‘Pain points for the grid’

Later in the morning’s sessions, panelists including technology providers and system integrators, financiers and experts discussed the role of energy storage in the power system. The conversation included a focus on financing structures and business models for storage in the Asia-Pacific (APAC) region.

Revenue models for energy storage around the world are varied, from contracted revenues for flexible capacity or grid services, to merchant revenues from market participation.

George Garabandic, principal consultant and energy storage lead for the APAC region with DNV, said that where energy storage can help grid operators solve their biggest “pain points” will be where stable revenue structures will be found.

Critical services to solve those pain points “will become contracted services,” Garabandic said, and in particular people should think about understanding which services are most critical among them, that present challenges participation through spot markets cannot be relied upon to deliver the reliability the grid needs.

“Playing into pain points of the grid will be essential,” Garabandic said.

The DNV expert cited the example of energy storage to absorb shocks to the network of short circuited currents, and to provide inertia. The latter, typically delivered as a byproduct of running thermal generation in the traditional model – which is clearly less available as thermal plants are overtaken by variable renewable energy (VRE) in terms of capacity growth – is likely the more dominant and pressing priority, Garabandic said.

Nicolas Leong, energy business director for North and Southeast Asia with technology provider and system integrator Wärtsilä, said that in the past, the running of power grids was always talked about in terms of energy capacity. Today, Leong said, the conversation is about how flexible a grid can be in balancing different sources of energy against different demand profiles. Storage is a key technology, among others including demand side response, for adding that flexibility.

The 1st Energy Storage Summit Asia, continues on 12 July 2023 in Singapore. Hosted by Energy-Storage.news publisher Solar Media, the event will help give clarity on this nascent, yet quickly growing market, bringing together a community of credible independent generators, policymakers, banks, funds, off-takers and technology providers. For more information, go to the website.

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A large group of leading institutional investors across continental Europe, the Nordics, the United Kingdom, North America and the Asia-Pacific region participated in the first close of Copenhagen Infrastructure V (CI V), the fifth flagship fund from Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (CIP). Backed by additional investors, the fund is on track to reach its target size of $13 billion and is set to become the largest fund globally dedicated to greenfield renewable energy infrastructure investments.

“Reaching nearly $6 billion at first close is a testament to the importance of the fund, and the confidence placed in our industrial approach to energy infrastructure investments,” says Jakob Baruel Poulsen, managing partner at CIP. “With its greenfield focus and large and diversified portfolio, CI V has the potential to significantly contribute to and accelerate the energy transition on a global scale, while generating strong returns for our investors.”

The fund will focus on greenfield investments within large-scale renewable energy infrastructure. It has a global reach and intends to diversify investments across technologies such as contracted offshore wind, energy storage, onshore wind and solar in low-risk OECD countries in North America, Western Europe and Asia Pacific.

CI V is the largest project pipeline of any CIP fund to date. At first close, the fund has ownership of more than 40 renewable energy infrastructure projects with a total potential CI V commitment of approximately $22 billion, corresponding to more than 150% of the target fund size.

The large seed portfolio provides significant optionality and flexibility in project selection and portfolio construction, as well as investment execution robustness and visibility. In June, CI V took its first final investment decision on an over 400 MW onshore wind project in the U.S., expected to begin construction in the coming months.

Based on the current portfolio, CI V is targeting to add an estimated 20 GW of new clean energy capacity to the grid, enough to power more than 10 million average households with renewable energy.

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They will be deployed at the Audorf Süd substation and Ottenhofen substation and, subject to necessary regulatory approvals, could come online in 2025. Fluence described them as ‘pilot projects’ with a view to more deployments in future.

It is Fluence’s second transmission network project in Germany – a segment it is strategically focusing on with a specific product, Ultrastack, launched earlier this year – after another transmission system operator (TSO) TransnetBW ordered a 250MW/250MWh BESS in October 2022. The segment is sometimes called storage-as-transmission.

50Hertz Transmission and Amprion make up the remaining two of four TSOs in Germany. All four are deploying ‘Grid Boosters’, with Amprion announcing a ‘distributed’ approach to its project recently while 50Hertz hasn’t detailed its firm plans yet.

Grid Booster BESS projects provide a variety of functions to help TSOs manage their grid in light of an increasing renewable energy mix, which in some countries also comes with an increasing mismatch between where power is generated and consumed, and growing demand. In Germany, the north is where most wind generation is located while the south has the big demand areas.

The high-voltage grid in Germany (and in many other places) operates with additional power lines which are not fully utilised, but are there to step in and guarantee safe operation in the case of a power failure. Grid Boosters can provide this function instead, allowing a more full utilisation of the power lines.

Overall, the projects should help the transmission system capacity, minimise grid interventions, increase renewable penetration, reduce the need for grid expansion, improve security of supply, all of which should ultimately reduce costs to the end-consumer.

So far, the Grid Booster announcements by TenneT, TransnetBW and Amprion total 700MW of BESS. In the second draft of Germany’s grid development plan for 2037/2045, the TSO assume up to 54.5GW of large energy storage systems on the German grid by 2045 under scenario C2045, Fluence said.

Markus Meyer, managing director at Fluence, said: “TenneT’s Grid Boosters will be the seventh and eighth storage as-transmission projects Fluence is deploying. Our team is developing the complex applicationsrequired for these types of projects in our Erlangen lab and research facility and we continue toinvest strongly in our German presence.”

The company is also deploying storage-as-transmission projects in Lithuania spread across four substations, and should be coming online this year.

Tim Meyerjürgens, COO of TenneT, commented: “We will not be able to adapt the transmission grid to the new challenges of the new energy system with grid expansion alone. The integration of electricity from renewables into the transmission grid will also depend to a large extent on operating resources, with which we can flexibly control the transmission grid.”

“We are therefore pleased to have won Fluence as a strong and competent partner with many years of experience in the field of storage solutions. Grid Boosters are important and tangible solutions for a secure and affordable electricity supply.”

Politicians alongside TenneT and Fluence representatives at the Fluence Testfield in Erlangen, Germany

A render of the second of the two projects. Image: Fluence and TenneT Ottenhofen Energy Storage Project.

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