What that is supposed to signify is that energy storage systems, while increasingly recognised as a vital enabling tool of the low carbon energy transition, come from a wide range of different vendors, encompassing different technologies, making it a sometimes complex task to create the right solution.

The project, part of the EU’s Horizon Europe innovation programme, will create an “innovative middleware”, an IT architecture that means customers aren’t locked into requiring a single vendor’s hardware and is technology agnostic enough to enable simpler integration of storage systems.

It will leverage advanced tech like AI and focus on data interoperability and standardisation, while the resulting software solutions, aimed at a launch before the end of 2025, will crucially be open source.

InterSTORE officially kicked off at the beginning of this year, led by German science and tech university RWTH Aachen, which has a faculty specialising in energy storage.

It covers nine different residential, commercial and industrial (C&I) and e-mobility-based use cases for energy storage, with solutions to be tried out at four different test facilities, one in Portugal, one in Germany, one in Italy and another in Austria.

Enel X, Eaton among project partners

Enel subsidiary Enel X is one of the 12 participating industry partners and this week issued a release detailing the work it is doing for the project.

Enel X will create software to predict and monitor energy consumption, while optimising the management of energy storage systems and distributed energy resources (DER) like solar PV, electric vehicle (EV) chargers, as well as the loads that the stored energy will be used to meet.

It will be tested at the Italian company’s own facility in Rome, called X Lab, with Enel X CEO Francesco Venturini commenting that the project is largely aligned with the company’s existing work to date in “developing solutions to improve the efficiency of storage systems”.

“It is now more urgent than ever to streamline energy storage processes, and we must be prepared to take on this challenge in order to carry out the energy transition and fully embrace a circular mindset,” Venturini said.

In 2021, Energy-Storage.news interviewed Enel X Battery Energy Storage solutions chief David J.A. Post, who explained just how central software is to the value proposition of C&I energy storage. Enel X launched shortly after its parent company bought up US energy storage software developer Demand Energy in 2017.

Also taking part is power management technology specialist Eaton. Eaton’s energy management system (EMS), is currently compatible with solar PV systems, as well as with the company’s own EV charge and battery storage hardware.

Eaton will work with other EMS providers to compare and contrast how their systems work and operate, and then seek to figure out how new DERs such as heat pumps or hydrogen electrolysers can be added into the EMS’ control system capabilities.

“The sun doesn’t always shine and the wind doesn’t always blow—so widespread energy storage is vital to Europe’s successful transition to renewables and the electrification of everything. However, today’s solutions are very diverse and often incompatible,” Dominik Laska, director of Eaton’s European Innovation Centre said in February.

“However, today’s solutions are very diverse and often incompatible. To enable widescale adoption, we need a unified approach to energy storage management.”

Along with more established players like Enel X and Eaton, others participating in the InterSTORE interoperability and standardisation project are newer names.

One is CyberGrid, a provider of a cloud-based platform for managing grids and DER, with a background in virtual power plant (VPP) aggregation technologies. Its flagship product is CyberNOC, a platform for aggregating energy flexibility and monetisation.

Together with its parent company, Austrian flexibility services provider EVN, CyberGrid will recruit around 30 flexibility assets used by residential or small commercial customers for a demonstration of how an enhanced version of CyberNOC can add interoperability with other providers’ technologies, be used to optimise operation of battery energy storage system (BESS) assets and interface with software for smart energy solutions at community level.

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Energy storage was front-and-centre of the updated report, receiving more mentions than solar and wind put together, which outlines how the state will achieve 100% renewable energy by 2045. Namely, it will need 183GW of clean energy capacity, including generation and storage.

“We will not be able to build a reliable, clean electric grid using solar and wind energy alone,” it reads.

“California needs more diverse clean energy resources – including batteries, clean hydrogen, and long-duration storage – and a wide range of technologies and resources to meet the unprecedented growth in demand for electricity at all hours of the day and different times of year.”

It went on to say that energy storage, covering all three technologies outlined above, will enable the provision of clean energy 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.

The update estimates that California will have 5,000MW of battery storage online by June 1 this year, increasing to 19,500MW by 2035 and 52,000MW by 2045. However, it may have already hit the 5,000MW mark according to figures from S&P released this week, covered by Energy-Storage.news.

Newsom commented: “California has shown we have a vision, and that vision is achievable. This update highlights how we have hit our early targets, some even ahead of schedule, but we are in a race against climate change. We must build more, faster, to ensure California has the clean, reliable and affordable electricity it needs to power our future.”

The update added that the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) has ordered the procurement by the state’s utilities of 2,000MW of new long-duration energy storage (LDES) projects and another 2,000MW of clean firm electric resources (like geothermal) by 2028.

Those orders were included in an update to its Mid-Term Reliability Procurement – the framework which has seen utilities procure gigawatts of four-hour battery storage – in February, and defined LDES as eight hours of discharge duration or more.

Some utilities, specifically community choice aggregators (CCAs), have already been procuring eight-hour systems already, like one from Clean Power Alliance recently.

The update also highlighted that new, voluntary environmental review permitting process was brought in last year for clean energy projects including energy storage, and facilities that can manufacture or assemble clean energy technologies, including energy storage.

The California ISO (CAISO), which runs the bulk of the state’s grid, is also making changes which will make it easier for energy storage resources to participate in the electricity market.

The CAISO market is expected to account for half of the roughly 3.2GW of battery storage expected to come online in the US during the current quarter, according to S&P.

See a full breakdown of how the state plans to fully decarbonise its electricity grid by 2045, with the proportion of resources split between different kinds of generation and energy storage.

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The Q2 2023 edition of our downstream solar journal, PV Tech Power, is now available to download, leading with an in-depth look at some of Europe’s emerging solar PV markets and the dynamics behind their growth and development.

‘Storage & Smart Power’ by Energy-Storage.news

As always, ‘Storage & Smart Power’, the section of the journal contributed by our team at Energy-Storage.news, returns. To coincide with the launch of ESN Premium, it’s our biggest to date, with five top tier-quality articles.

They include:

Net Zero’s Missing Link: Long Duration Energy Storage

Julia Souder, CEO of the Long Duration Energy Storage Council, explores energy storage as the cornerstone of power grids of the future.

How we delivered the 98MW/196MWh Pillswood BESS Project

A case study into how Europe’s biggest battery project got built, from Alex Thornton at UK renewable energy and battery storage developer-investor-owner Harmony Energy.

Cloud-based analytics for de-risking BESS deployment and operation

A special two-part article on how cloud-based battery analytics can play a major role in the lifecycle of BESS assets, with particular regard to the first years of operation which typically present the biggest risks.

You can download your digital copy of PV Tech Power 34 via our subscription service here.

Energy-Storage.news Premium subscribers receive every copy of PV Tech Power as part of their subscription as soon as they are published, as well as exclusive content on PV Tech, weekly briefing emails and a host of other benefits.

For more details on Energy-Storage.news Premium, including how to subscribe, click here.

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The public tender was coordinated by Gaz Electricité de Grenoble (GEG), the utility and distribution network operator (DNO) for the large city also in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region.

The framework contract will enable the four companies to place orders to Entech over the next six months for up to 50MWh of battery storage across six sites, the company’s largest potential order to-date.

Entech’s deployed systems will provide frequency regulation services for the French and European power grids, replacing existing frequency control assets like legacy thermal power plants. The company is based in Quimper, Brittany, was founded in 2016 and is listed on the Paris stock exchange under the ALESE ticker.

It is the second major piece of energy storage news coming out of France in the space of a week.

Last week, developer ZE Energy inaugurated a solar-plus-storage project with 18.6MWp of PV and a 7.5MWh lithium-ion battery energy storage system (BESS), according to local reports.

It is its second such project after it commissioned an 8MW PV, 3.75MW BESS in late 2021. Both projects are in the Loir-et-Cher department of the Centre-Val de Loire region.

Françoise Gilot-Leclerc, Mayor of Gièvres, commented: “The Gièvres solar park was set up on a former quarry and thus enables intelligent reconversion of a degraded site. It is the culmination of a project that combines economic and technological viability and green energy production. As elected officials, it is our role to offer our citizens ready-to-go energy solutions that respect the environment.”

Research firm LCP Delta recently forecasted that France would see around 337MW of BESS capacity come online in 2023. A 3.3MWh BESS co-located with a wind farm was turned online earlier this month in Brittany.

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As reported by our UK colleagues at Solar Power Portal, the investment fund’s renewable energy and storage developer-owner-investor company Harmony Energy made the claim in presenting a trading update for its activities as of the end of April.

At 98MW/196MWh, Pillswood BESS, in the county of Yorkshire, was energised in November 2022 and is located next to and connects to the National Grid Creyke Beck substation which will also be the grid interconnection point for Dogger Bank in the North Sea, currently the world’s largest planned offshore wind farm.

Pillswood BESS is claimed to be the largest BESS in Europe, a claim which appears to hold true, although various much larger projects are known to be in development, particularly in Great Britain (GB), the continent’s early leader in battery storage.

Harmony Energy itself has a project which began construction last summer through a joint venture (JV) with Fotowatio Renewable Ventures (FRV), and is slightly bigger, at 99MW/198MWh.

Project’s 2-hour duration discussed as early as 2016

What’s perhaps more important a takeaway than that however is Harmony Energy’s decision to pursue longer duration battery projects than has typically been seen to date in the GB market.

In the newest edition of our quarterly journal PV Tech Power (Vol.35), Harmony Energy development director Alex Thornton writes a case study and development history of the Pillswood BESS, offering insights into many of the decisions made and the process of getting the near-200MWh project financed and built.

Thornton writes that Harmony Energy began originating Pillswood as early as 2016. That was even before the game changing 200MW enhanced frequency response (EFR) tender hosted by National Grid awarded the UK’s first-ever tranche of long-term contracts for energy storage assets.

Harmony Energy took a “leap of faith” into the market, according to Thornton, believing that the strong fundamentals of the country’s need for energy storage would create a strong enough business case for lithium-ion battery storage assets.

“European and UK government policies were driving a reduction in emissions and, in the UK, we were also seeing a reduction in the reliance on centralised coal-fired power stations. With the resulting movement towards wind and solar, we firmly believed that BESS had an increasing role to play in the energy supply of the future,” Alex Thornton writes in his article.

From those early stages of planning and preparation, Harmony Energy was already speaking with Tesla about “the potential for 2-hour lithium batteries”. Tesla would eventually sign a contract to provide the project’s BESS equipment and manage market participation through its AutoBidder software platform in April 2021.

Longer durations a sign of shifting revenue stack potential

“Where other UK developers were only speaking about 30 minute or 1-hour duration batteries, we identified that the UK energy system would need longer duration storage as we continued to decarbonise and decentralise generation,” Thornton writes.

Indeed, data provided as part of Harmony Energy Income Trust’s Q1 2023 trading update shows that revenues for 2-hour duration BESS assets in the GB fleet were consistently higher and at times almost double the amount earned by projects with 1-hour to 1.49-hour duration between May 2022 and April 2023.

Various industry sources that have said the UK market for energy storage will continue to favour longer duration assets, and the market appears to be following that trend, or indeed creating it.

Most of the 20.7GW of grid-scale battery storage assets in planning during 2022 in the country – representing 295 potential sites – were expected to be “at least 2-hour duration”, according to an Energy-Storage.news Guest Blog published in February from Mollie McCorkindale, market analyst at Solar Media Market Research.

This was a marked difference from 2017, the year BESS buildout really began in the UK. Most projects at that time were either 0.5-hour or 1-hour duration, and the average project size in megawatt-hours was 4.4MWh. By 2022, the average size became 36MWh, again, partly due to the increase in duration, McCorkindale wrote.

As noted even before the end of 2022 by another market analyst, Corentin Baschet at Clean Horizon, batteries in the UK – and in the rest of Europe – are already moving towards applications that require longer durations, such as energy trading on day ahead, intraday or imbalance markets.

They may not be actively moving away from providing short duration, high power applications for ancillary services, but those revenues for short-term grid-balancing services are representing a smaller share of the total revenue stack than before.

“Typically, it is clear that batteries will have to move from power revenues, associated with FCR or DC, to energy revenues associated to trading on the day ahead or intraday or imbalance markets as these markets are deeper,” Baschet said back in November last year.

“Revenue cannibalisation for storage is a real thing,” Baschet added.

This appears to be playing out in real-time in Britain, where market data group Modo Energy recently said firm frequency response (FFR) ancillary service auction prices had fallen to a three-year low due to market saturation.

There are only so many megawatts of balancing services a grid needs and from prices in excess of £20/MW/hour from September to November 2022, reference price for April’s tender was just £5.69/MW/hour.

This is broadly expected to be the case across other ancillary service markets, and Harmony Energy, which is planning its portfolio of nine large-scale BESS projects (including Pillswood and one other that are already online) to all be 2-hour duration.

In its trading update, the company noted that the UK’s Balancing Mechanism, which is the primary mechanism for managing supply and demand on the grid in real-time, is well-suited to 2-hour duration assets of the type it is building.

It’s important to note as well that although ancillary services prices soared along with electricity prices last year as the Russian invasion of Ukraine’s knock-on effects played havoc with gas markets, that dynamic too is beginning to shift as prices come back down again, or at least don’t fluctuate as wildly as before.

You can read Alex Thornton from Harmony Energy’s case study: ‘How we delivered the 98MW/196MWh Pillswood BESS Project’ in PV Tech Power Vol.35, which is out now. Subscription to the quarterly journal, is included as part of the Energy-Storage.news Premium service. Every edition of PV Tech Power includes ‘Storage & Smart Power’, a dedicated section contributed by the Energy-Storage.news team.

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The roadmap outlines the policies to help the Sunshine State achieve complete decarbonisation by 2045, including by encouraging investment in project’s like Moxion’s, the company said.

Moxion’s facility at the former Ford Point Assembly Plant will be a 205,000 square foot facility with an eventual annual production capacity of 7GWh a year of its mobile BESS units. It did not give a date for when it expects the facility to become operational, however.

The company sells its solution to industries that typically rely on on-site diesel generation, including the film and TV industry through deals with companies like Amazon. Moxion also sells into the live events, disaster response, utilities, construction and defence sectors.

“California is the #1 manufacturing state in America. The future happens here first, and we have to accelerate our transition. We can achieve reliability through ingenuity, through entrepreneurial spirit, through creativity, and not just through inspiration but desperation,” said Governor Gavin Newsom.

“Out of the ashes of the wildfire, this idea was conceived. To come up with an idea, put pen to paper, get the capital, get the workforce trained and operational, manufacturing in a community that has been ravaged by the fossil fuel industry in the past, but now with a fresh air of progress, you’ve marked the framework of the future. It’s an American story. It’s a California made story.”

In September last year, Moxion raised US$100 million in a Series B with investors including Amazon and Microsoft, and it said it will benefit from many of the tax incentive programmes for energy storage included in the Inflation Reduction Act.

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As industry observers and regular readers of this site will likely know, Form Energy, launched under the leadership of former Tesla executive Matteo Jaramillo in 2017, claims to have developed a battery chemistry based around oxidising (rusting) of iron that can store electrical energy and discharge it over durations of 100 hours or more, cost-effectively.

That said, the battery chemistry had remained a closely-guarded secret even after the MIT-supported company emerged from stealth mode. It was finally revealed in mid-2021, with Jaramillo speaking to Energy-Storage.news about it, one of a number of interviews the CEO has spoken to this site for.

The technology is not aimed at replacing lithium-ion in the battery energy storage system (BESS) industry, in fact, Jaramillo said, it is “quite the opposite” in that the iron-air battery is a complementary technology that will do longer duration applications that lithium isn’t suitable for.

At the same time, the iron-air battery is not best suited for the short burst, high power applications lithium-ion does especially well. Lithium and iron-air batteries together could make “low-cost, highly reliable renewable power plants and complete systems,” that could replace so-called ‘baseload’ resources like coal and gas, Jaramillo said.

The company claimed its batteries can be made using abundant materials and potentially sited close to demand for individual projects or portfolios of clean energy resources.

Form Energy coal plants as well as repurposing historic steel mill

As noted by Energy-Storage.news reporter Cameron Murray as West Virginia Governor Jim Justice signed off on a grant worth US$105 million to Form Energy in February, there’s a nice symmetry in the company choosing an iconic Rust Belt site like the Weirton Steel mill to site its 55-acre factory.  

At that time, Form Energy said it would require about US$760 million investment to get the plant up and running, while Justice said West Virginia offered Form Energy a structured finance package worth up to US$290 million to site the plant in the state.

Form Factory 1 represents just one of many recent investments into clean energy manufacturing and deployment announced in the US – US$150 billion of such commitments have been made public – since the passing of the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA). Another related development recently brought to West Virginia is from Our Next Energy (ONE) a prospective lithium iron phosphate (LFP) battery manufacturer which could assemble grid-scale storage systems at a new US$500 million manufacturing hub in the state for which the company will provide a solar-plus-storage microgrid.

About 500 locations in 16 US states were considered before Weirton was selected for reasons including its existing infrastructure, such as easy access to river, rail and road networks, and more than 750 people will be employed at the plant when ramped, although figures for expected annual production capacity have not been disclosed as yet.

As well as repurposing a steel plant, the company’s initial deployments look likely to include grid-scale iron-air battery storage systems at repurposed coal plant sites for utility Xcel Energy, for which Bill Gates’ Breakthrough Energy Ventures, an investor in Form Energy, recently pledged a US$20 million grant.

An earlier-announced pilot project with Minnesota’s Great River Energy will see a 1MW/150MWh iron-air battery deployed, while Form is also known to be in discussions with Georgia Power about possible projects.

The company is thought to have raised about US$800 million in financing to date, with its most recent funding round a US$450 million Series D.

Dignitaries including US Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm and Senators Joe Manchin and Shelley Moore Capito gave prepared remarks at Friday’s event, as did West Virginia Economic Development Secretary Mitch Carmichael.

Watch the livestream of the groundbreaking on Form Energy’s YouTube channel below:

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The growth should have been even faster, however, with 2.448GW of projects initially proposed to come online during the first quarter, compared to the 710MW in actual commissionings, S&P added.

Major projects that should have come online but were pushed to Q2 include the 260MW Sonoran Solar Energy and 150MW Arroyo Energy Storage, from NextEra Energy Resources and Enel Green Power in Arizona and New Mexico, respectively.

Battery storage project delays have been seen globally, largely driven by grid connection waits and supply chain-related delays.

The Q1 deployment figures contrast with those of trade body American Clean Power Association, which said that Q1 battery storage additions totalled 461 MW/1,075 MWh in Q1, down 32% year-on-year. Energy-Storage.news covered the trade body’s full-year 2022 figures last week here.

Some 498.6MW came online in the ERCOT, Texas market, just over 70% of the 710MW figure. The Western Electricity Coordinating Council grid, which covers the whole western US including California, saw 115MW came online, 17% of the total.

As of the end of the quarter, California (or specifically the grid operated by CAISO) now has 5.2GW online, 48.2% of the US’ total capacity, while ERCOT’s 3.287GW gives it a 30.5% market share. By MWh capacity, CAISO’s share is even larger, with two-thirds of the 29.640GW online.

S&P’s research also listed the largest projects to have come online during the first quarter. They were:

Acciona Energy North America’s 190-MW BT Cunningham Storage in Texas

Aypa Power Development’s 155.5-MW Wolf Tank Storage facility in Texas

Key Capture Energy’s 51.5-MW KCE TX 19 facility in Texas

Key Capture Energy’s 51.5-MW KCE TX 21 facility in Texas

NextEra Energy Resources’ 50-MW Buena Vista Energy Center facility in New Mexico

Arizona Public Service’s 50-MW El Sol BESS facility in Arizona

For Q2, S&P said 3.177GW of projects are expected to come online, of which 51% would be in the CAISO grid and ERCOT accounting for just 6.3%, with 200MW coming online.

When Acciona acquired the Cunningham project in late 2022 it claimed it would be the largest BESS on the Texas grid when commissioned.

That title may now be held by a 200MW project brought online by developer Eolian and system integrator Wärtsilä which Energy-Storage.news was told has an energy storage capacity in MWh of over 500. However, it is actually two co-located BESS units sited together with separate grid connections.

S&P also details the largest project owners by operational capacity. They are NextEra Energy Resources top with 1.421GW online, followed by Axium Infrastructure with 733MW, Vistra Energy with 673MW, LS Power with 615MW and Terra-Gen with 581MW.

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It comes six months after RPC announced it would work with UK battery storage developer Eelpower to deploy 1GW in the UK, covered by our sister site Solar Power Portal, which wasn’t mentioned in today’s announcement.

Kevin Devlin, who took over as CEO of RPC from Bob Psaradellis last month, commented on the partnership with Greenfield.

“Lithium-ion battery storage is currently the most flexible short duration storage technology available and will play a crucial role in balancing our energy system. The UK is already a leader in this sector, and we are excited to partner with Greenfield in order to accelerate and amplify this growth,” he said.

RPC was launched by the Canada Pension Plan Investments (CPP Investments), a state-owned pension investment fund, in December 2020. It recently announced a 1GW JV for onshore wind in Poland with Tundra Advisory and a similar sized development partnership for solar in Spain with Euder Energy.

It’s been a busy week for the UK battery storage market. Today has also seen developers Cero Generation and Enso Energy reach financial close on a 49.5MW/99MWh battery energy storage system in South Gloucestershire, UK. Projects under 50MW benefit from a faster regulatory and permitting process in the UK.

The project will come online in late 2024 and will be co-located with the 49.9MW Larks Green solar farm, which went online earlier this month.

Last week saw Pulse Clean Energy secure over US$200 million in debt for its battery storage pipeline while Clearstone Energy sold two projects totalling 107MW in southern England to Foresight Energy Infrastructure Partners, covered by Solar Power Portal.

RPC’s backer CPP Investments has also been active in investing in the non-lithium-ion battery space, putting capital into iron-air battery firm Form Energy and advanced compressed air energy storage (A-CAES) company Hydrostor.

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Examining the milestones realised, it’s not difficult to see why.

Tax credit scheme on the way

Most recently, the 2023 Federal Budget built upon the 30% Clean Technology Investment Tax Credit (ITC) announced in November’s 2022 Fall Economic Statement, with the introduction of a 30% Clean Technology Manufacturing Credit and a 15% Clean Electricity ITC, which expands eligibility to non-taxable entities. In combination with the recapitalisation of the Smart Renewables and Electrification Pathways Program (SREP), these initiatives are being recognised, in Canada and abroad, as an indication that Canada understands the vital role energy storage will play in Canada’s energy transition.

These mechanisms represent critical steps on Canada’s part to keep pace with the United States’ ITCs through the IRA, which are estimated to increase US storage deployments by as much as 24% over the next five years.

It’s not hard to imagine in the context of a 68% increase in energy storage worldwide in 2022, with additional commitments from several markets totaling 130GW by 2030.

Recent major milestones for Ontario and Alberta

Canada has seen several landmark developments at the provincial level as well, including the government of Ontario’s October 2022 announcement of one of largest competitive energy storage procurements in North America at 2.5 GW, with the first tranche of projects announced on 16 May.

This milestone was further augmented by this spring’s announcement of the 250MW Oneida Energy Storage project moving toward commercial operation in Ontario, as the project partners achieved financial close with key long-term contracting in place.

In addition to the 100MW already installed in Alberta, the province has projects with a total capacity of more than 2500MW in the queue for connection.

Elsewhere, on the east coast, NB Power is soliciting proposals for 50MW of energy storage projects in New Brunswick and Nova Scotia recently proposed amendments to the Electricity Act to enable grid-scale battery contracts and procurements.

Each of these actions at both the federal and provincial level are important steps forward for Canada to achieve its ambitious net zero goals.

Coming soon: the 250MW/1,000MWh Oneida project in Ontario. Image: NRStor.

Canada still needs much more storage for net zero to succeed

Energy Storage Canada’s 2022 report, Energy Storage: A Key Net Zero Pathway in Canada indicates Canada will need a minimum of 8 to 12GW of energy storage to ensure Canada achieves its 2035 goals. Moreover, while each province’s supply structure differs, potential capacity for energy storage was identified in all Canadian provinces, meeting demand needs and optimizing generation, transmission, and distribution assets.

However, that leaves a wide gap to close to realize Canada’s goals and to reach the full potential for energy storage in the country. Even the low end of the estimated potential for storage is equivalent to Manitoba’s entire installed generating capacity as of 2020.

Today’s national installed capacity of energy storage is less than 1GW.

The good news is the flexibility and diversity of energy storage technologies is set to meet the challenge:

Energy storage systems can level out supply in urban centres and capacity constrained areas, avoiding the cost of transmission system upgrades.

Energy storage can balance the intermittent nature of wind and solar, providing reliable, clean generation.

Paired with nuclear generation or hydropower or other traditional forms of generation, energy storage can provide more consistent and cost-effective production.

For every resource and grid, there is a storage technology and duration to match, whether it be short duration grid-scale lithium-ion batteries, compressed air, or flywheel storage, geothermal or pumped hydro.

We are seeing in Canada and across the globe the critical recognition of the unique role energy storage can play and the diversity of services these resources can provide.

However, there is still work to be done if Canada is to capitalise on the momentum built by the 2023 Federal Budget and the milestones of the past year.

It is vital going forward that policymakers and government agencies coordinate their efforts to revamp the regulatory and legislative framework to include and accommodate energy storage. System planning and procurement approaches need to evolve to ensure pricing and investment incentives reflect the reality of storage deployment and the benefits it provides.

Long-duration storage should be a key component of Canada’s energy future

Additionally, while it is important we act and act quickly to deploy energy storage to meet the evolving needs of Canada’s energy system, we also need to act with an eye toward the long-term beyond 2035.

This means acting now to incorporate long-duration energy storage (LDES) assets, which can store large amounts of electricity for several hours or days and includes technologies such as pumped hydro electric storage, emerging battery storage, thermal storage, or compressed air.

And Canada has long history with LDES, notably Ontario Power Generation’s (OPG) pumped hydro storage project in Niagara Falls, and about 90% of the installed energy storage capacity around the world to date is pumped hydro storage.

There are several long duration technologies that are proven and operational now. ESC members are already deploying these technologies around the globe and they’re keen to develop comparable projects here in Canada now.

Which is good, because per the Canadian Climate Institute, two-thirds of the reductions necessary to meet Canada’s 2035 goals can be achieved by integrating existing technologies.

At Energy Storage Canada, we are excited to capitalise on the current momentum to ensure energy storage is among them, to 2035 and beyond.

You can also read Energy-Storage.news editor Andy Colthorpe’s Editor’s Blog from Friday (26 May), ‘What just happened in Canada’s busiest week for energy storage’ (Premium access required) here, while Alberta and Ontario’s energy storage markets are in focus in the new edition of PV Tech Power (Vol.35) due out in the coming days.

About the Author

Justin Rangooni is a lawyer with over a decade experience in the energy sector, starting with being a Senior Policy Advisor for the Ontario Minister of Energy and then as a the Ontario Policy Lead for the Canadian Wind Energy Association and most recently Vice President, Policy and Government Affairs at the Electricity Distributors Association. Energy Storage Canada (ESC) is a not-for-profit organisation dedicated solely to the growth and market development of the country’s energy storage sector as a means of accelerating the realisation of Canada’s ongoing energy transition and Net Zero goals.

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