The battery energy storage system which started a trial period this month. Image: SINCRO.GRID.

A 10MW/50MWh battery energy storage system (BESS) spread across two substations in Slovenia has started a trial and testing period.

The BESS projects are located at the Okroglo and Pektre substations and started their trial period this month, the company launching them announced. They are part of the SINCRO.GRID project, a smart grid investment project in Slovenia and Croatia which was launched in 2016 and with €40 million (US$43.25 million) in financing from the European Union.

It aims to increase grid flexibility in both countries. Specifically, the project aims to improve the voltage quality and frequency control, as well as increase the capacity and flexibility of the network for a more reliable supply. It also aims to help integrate increased amounts of renewable energy sources (RES) onto the grid.

The partners in the project are the Slovenian and Croatian transmission operators ELES and HOPs, respectively, and the two countries’ distribution system operators, SODO and HEP ODS. The SINCO.GRID project was born out of the realisation that the two countries faced similar technical challenges.

It will be managed by the transmission operators, each of whom will be responsible for the implementation of technologies in their respective system, while distribution system operators providing information about the operation of Renewable Energy Sources (RES) on the grid. This will help the transmission operators to forecast ancillary service needs.

The project website adds that the control centres of the distribution and transmission operators will be connected via ICT infrastructure and system integration primarily using the semantic model (Common Information Model or CIM).

Other aspects of the SINCRO.GRID project include a virtual cross-border control centre (VCBCC) and a dynamic thermal rating (DTR) to assess operating limits and better utilise transmission lines and transformers. The VCBCC links the electricity systems of the two countries and will integrate the DTR, new compensation devices for reactive power control and the BESS projects. Shunt reactors have been installed at substations in Mraclin and Melina, in Croatia.

Most energy storage news in Slovenia has come from private company NGEN which has launched two BESS projects using Tesla’s Megapack product.

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Photo Courtesy: Burns & McDonnell

Vistra’s Brightside Solar Facility in Live Oak County, Texas, is online and generating electricity. The 50 MW solar photovoltaic (PV) project is part of the company’s growing portfolio of zero-carbon power generation assets, known as Vistra Zero. Brightside Solar Facility is the first of seven new renewable and energy storage projects that the company is bringing online across Texas over the next few years. The Texas-sized package of zero-carbon projects, all located within the ERCOT market, are part of a near $1 billion capital investment by Vistra.

“With Brightside and additional Vistra Zero projects poised to come online across Texas, our vision of transitioning our fleet to cleaner electric generation is becoming a reality,” says Curt Morgan, CEO of Vistra. “As Texas continues its rapid rate of economic and population growth, Vistra is investing in the grid of the future while serving the needs of its customers who are increasingly seeking green alternatives. We’re proud of our long history of powering Texas and look forward to continuing to strengthen the ERCOT grid with additional power to help build the sustainable future all Texans deserve.”

Also expected online in spring 2022 in Texas are the 260 MW/260 MWh DeCordova Energy Storage Facility (Hood County) and 108 MW Emerald Grove Solar Facility (Crane County).

Situated on 430 acres in Live Oak County, Brightside is comprised of 147,732 photovoltaic solar panels that can generate enough electricity to power approximately 25,000 average residences in the ERCOT market during normal grid conditions. Initial project construction began in January 2021.

“With unmatched development, commercial and operational teams, requisite capabilities, and access to capital, we are proud to be playing a leading role during this great energy transition,” adds Morgan. “For 140 years, Vistra and its predecessor companies have generated affordable and reliable electricity. We take seriously our responsibility of providing an essential product, while balancing our commitment to the environment and the communities where we work and live. The way we produced power in 1882 looks very different now – but our commitment to our fellow Texans remains the same.”

Brightside Solar Facility utilizes solar panel technology from First Solar. Burns & McDonnell provided engineering and construction expertise.

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Tesla battery storage at Neoen’s Bulgana Green Power Hub in Victoria, Australia. Image: Elgar Middleton.

Neoen has been contracted by major energy generator-retailer AGL to provide a “virtual” charge or discharge of a battery system in Australia. 

The France-headquartered renewable energy and energy storage developer announced the deal today. A 70MW/140MWh portion of the energy stored in its 100MW/200MWh Capital Battery project, currently under construction in Canberra, will be leveraged by AGL.

What’s perhaps novel about the arrangement is that AGL will use it to participate in the National Electricity Market (NEM) from its connection in New South Wales, a completely different state from the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) where the Capital Battery is being built.

It’s the first deal of its type for what Neoen Australia CEO Louis de Sambucy described as an “innovative bespoke solution”.

“The virtual battery is an ideal firming tool which will become a core Neoen product and a key element in the success of our expanding range of client offerings.”

AGL chief operating officer Markus Brokhof said the deal will enable the company to add “flexible capacity that meets the energy needs of our customers to ensure they continue to have access to affordable and reliable energy”.

AGL will be able to virtually charge or discharge over the five minute settlement (5MS) trading intervals recently introduced into the NEM, helping it to counteract the growing duck curve of mismatch between times of plentiful solar generation and demand for energy as well as the evening peak demand periods. 

Neoen has raced into a leading position as a developer and owner of grid-scale battery energy storage system (BESS) facilities in Australia, from executing the landmark 150MW/193.5MWh Hornsdale Power Reserve in South Australia to its recently completed 300MW/450MWh Victorian Big Battery. 

With its Australia battery portfolio now including 576MW in operation or under construction, the Capital Battery was awarded as a contract to Neoen by the ACT state government. Construction of it began in December last year and it is scheduled for completion in H1 2023.

AGL’s 70MW virtual agreement is under a seven-year contract and Neoen emphasised that the Capital Battery will remain able to provide network services as agreed through the ACT tender. 

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India’s Central Electricity Authority has an expectation that more than 100GWh of battery storage will be needed by 2029-2030 to integrate renewable energy and ensure system reliability. Image: Tata Power Solar.

The government-controlled Solar Energy Corporation of India (SECI) has launched a 500MW/1,000MWh pilot tender for large-scale standalone battery storage.

SECI issued a Request for Selection (RFS) document yesterday, seeking to procure the battery energy storage systems (BESS) through a tariff-based competitive bidding process. It is expected to be the first stage in a procurement drive for 4,000MWh of BESS in total. 

The corporation, as its name suggests, is responsible for promoting solar energy in India as an arm of the National Solar Mission, and is administered by the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE).

In order to support the deployment and integration of 500GW of new non-fossil fuel energy capacity, the Central Electricity Authority (CEA) has modelled a need for 27GW/108GWh of battery storage by 2029-2030, in addition to 10,151MW of pumped hydro energy storage.  

The tender is for two BESS projects at a single site, which is at Fatehgarh-III substations in the state of Rajasthan. Land will be provided on a leasing/right-to-use basis, facilitated by SECI in agreement with the Transmission Licensee.

The systems will connect directly to India’s inter-state transmission system (ISTS) with an aggregate capacity of 1,000MWh, comprising two-hour duration systems. Bidding entities may propose to build one or both of the 250MW/500MWh projects sought.  

SECI will enter into a battery energy storage purchase agreement (BESPA) with winning bidders. The corporation said it has received interest from prospective buying entities that want to be able to use energy storage to deliver power on-demand, during both peak and off-peak times. 

Selected systems will be delivered on a build, own, operate and transfer basis and once commissioned, SECI intends to act as intermediary for use of the BESS and for charging-discharging. 

The tender is for new facilities only. An end date for submissions of 10 June 2022 has been set, with bids to open five days later. 

Sector poised for rapid growth

SECI signalled that it was preparing to launch the tender in October last year. Other large-scale tenders hosted directly by government entities are also expected, while a state-owned power company, NTPC, is already hosting its own 1,000MWh tender process. 

SECI contract manager Pratik Prasun said via social media site LinkedIn that the public procurement tender is a “first-of-its-kind concept in India, where two of the most important use cases of BESS will be tested on a large-scale,” drawing readers’ attention to a pre-bid meeting to be held on 6 May. 

India’s energy storage market is poised for rapid growth, with support from government lining up with growing private sector interest. As noted by the India Energy Storage Alliance (IESA) industry group, there is only about 85MWh of grid-connected BESS online or under construction in the country so far, but a solid pipeline of 4.6GWh, including tendered for and announced projects exists. 

This has recently led global players in the energy storage technology provider and system integrator space like Fluence and Powin Energy to enter the market. Both have partnered with major domestic players in the renewables space.

 In a recent interview, Powin Energy executive VP Danny Lu told Energy-Storage.news that the importance of strong local partners with a deep knowledge of the Indian energy sector cannot be overstated. Lu said that Powin’s local partner, O2 Power, will be responsible for entering bids into tenders like those launched by NTPC and SECI. 

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The Ubiquitous Energy team holds a 1.5×3-meter glass coated with one of Ubiquitous Energy’s UE Power transparent solar materials.

Ubiquitous Energy, a next-generation technology company developing transparent solar technology for architectural glass, has successfully demonstrated 1.5-meter-wide glass coated uniformly with the company’s UE Power transparent solar materials. This shows the ability to scale UE Power to large sizes uniformly, which is critical in achieving high-performing solar devices while maintaining the aesthetics and function of traditional low-emissivity window glass. The company’s upcoming high-volume manufacturing line will produce 1.5×3-meter, floor-to-ceiling, transparent solar windows.

UE Power is a transparent solar glass coating technology that is manufactured using vacuum physical vapor deposition (PVD), the same equipment used by manufacturers to coat architectural glass today. UE Power organic semiconductor materials were deposited in a full-size PVD prototype coater, showing near-perfect uniformity within 1-2% tolerance over 1.5-meter-wide glass for coatings that are tens of nanometers thick.

“Achieving this milestone prepares us well as we move our transparent solar technology from the pilot phase into full-scale manufacturing,” says Miles Barr, Ubiquitous Energy’s co-founder and CTO. “Architectural glass isn’t actually flat; it’s slightly wavy. For this reason, achieving highly uniform, defect-free thin film electronics like transparent solar over large glass sheets has historically been difficult by other methods like solution printing.”

“Well-established PVD coating technology gives us tight control over thickness and optical appearance of our transparent solar organic semiconductor materials and allows us to piggyback on the equipment and process controls that has been enjoyed by the architectural glass industry for decades,” adds Barr.

The prototype coater will now be replicated for the deposition of transparent solar materials in the company’s first high-volume U.S. manufacturing line, which is expected to be operational in 2024. Each 1.5×3-meter piece of UE Power glass could generate up to 1 kWh of electricity every day.

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Solar staff scanning and logging PV module serial numbers in the field.

Raptor Maps, a solar lifecycle management software provider, has closed $22 million in Series B funding for its Raptor Solar software platform. The round is led by Canadian private investment firm MacKinnon, Bennett & Co. (MKB), which specializes in accelerating innovation in energy, transportation and climate tech. Other investors include the Microsoft Climate Innovation Fund, Blue Bear Capital, DNV, Buoyant Ventures, Congruent Ventures, Data Point Capital and ENGIE New Ventures.

Raptor Solar is an advanced software-as-a-service platform for the entire solar lifecycle – from financing and development through operations. Raptor Solar lets utility-scale and C&I solar companies standardize and analyze data, collaborate, optimize PV assets, reduce risk, and lift financial return.

The SaaS platform serves as an auditable system of record featuring state-of-the-art digital twins of solar assets. Users can scan in module serial numbers to streamline warranty claims and verify supply chains.  Subscribers benefit from inspection analytics, productivity tools and ability to quantify financial loss and even benchmark portfolios against Raptor Maps’ global database.

“We’re very excited about our investment in the most sophisticated solar analytics and insights platform on the market,” says Chanel Damphousse, partner at MKB.  “Raptor Maps has some of the most intelligent and skilled experts in the solar industry, and their product roadmap represents a bold vision for how data married with productivity tools unlocks value across the lifecycle of solar assets.”

The funding will enable Raptor Maps to accelerate its hiring plans with significant investment in product, software and data science.  The company will rapidly advance its feature-rich product roadmap with more functionality related to workflow automation, work orders, investor reporting and insights powered machine learning.

“Making the solar industry more profitable represents progress towards advancing a sustainable energy future,” explains CEO and co-founder Nikhil Vadhavkar.  “Our mission is to build software that enables solar energy to scale.  We’re delighted to have partners with the right expertise to support our ambitious plans.”

“To meet the world’s urgent climate goals, the energy industry needs tools to become nimbler and deploy renewable energy quickly,” says Mark Kroese, general manager of sustainability solutions at Microsoft.  “Raptor Maps is digitizing solar supply chains, deployment and operations, which will help accelerate the global transition to cleaner energy solutions.”

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An existing Kontrolmatik production facility in Ankara, Turkey. Image: Kontrolmatik.

Factories aimed at making products for the battery energy storage system (BESS) industry have been announced by Turkey-headquartered Kontrolmatik and Ireland-headquartered Eaton. 

Kontrolmatik Technology, Energy and Engineering Inc began development activities at the beginning of April to build a lithium iron phosphate (LFP) battery factory with 1GWh annual production capacity in the US. 

The company is already building a facility of the same size in Ankara, Turkey, through a subsidiary called Pomega Energy Storage Technologies, targeting the promising Turkish market and wider EMEA region, which is expected to open before the end of this year.

Kontrolmatik is involved in everything from EPC contracting to system integration and manufacture of equipment for power generation, transmission and distribution as well as energy storage. 

It launched a US subsidiary, Kontrolmatik Technologies at the beginning of this year, headquartered in McLean, Virginia.

On its US expansion, the company said it is targeting grid-scale battery energy storage service opportunities as an integrator, developer and battery manufacturer, aiming for full vertical integration and supply chain management capabilities. 

It is also exploring opportunities in the commercial and industrial (C&I) market segments and will pursue both front-of-the-meter and behind-the-meter markets, including standalone and solar-plus-storage systems.   

Site selection options are already being explored and a decision is expected to be announced in June. 

The facility would join a handful of others in a sector which remains largely underserved by domestic manufacturing, despite soaring market demand. 

So far, while the development of electric vehicle (EV) battery gigafactories are on their way at numerous major sites in the US, Energy-Storage.news has so far only reported on planned new factories to produce LFP cells and systems from KORE Power, building a 12GWh factory in Arizona, SPARKZ, with a factory on the way in West Virginia and American Battery Factory, which hasn’t made concrete disclosures of its plans but claims it could open its first 3GWh facility within two years. 

Eaton targets expanding UPS and data centre markets

Power management tech company Eaton said yesterday that it is building a critical power management systems production campus in Vantaa, Finland, which it claimed will be state-of-the-art. 

The Vantaa plant is scheduled to be complete by the end of 2023 and lead to Eaton recruiting about 100 new staff. The facility will manufacture grid-interactive UPS equipment as well as energy storage systems.

It will also serve as Eaton’s centre for excellence in data centres, a market the company has been focused on for some time, and it will be sited geographically close to Scandinavia’s booming market. The Vantaa plant will also become Eaton’s Critical Power Solutions headquarters, targeting all UPS demand segments including commercial and industrial (C&I) buildings.

Eaton said it is seeing strong growth in demand for UPS. The new factory will move the company’s current activities from another smaller factory elsewhere in Espoo, Finland and enable expansion. 

It has a planned size of 16,500 m2, although annual production capacity was not disclosed and an Energy-Storage.news enquiry had not been replied to by the time of publication.   

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Energy storage should be made mainstream in the European Commission’s implementation of the REPowerEU action plan and in the ongoing review of the Electricity Market Design, the groups say. Image: Sébastien Bertrand.

Bill Gates-founded Breakthrough Energy, the European Association for Storage of Energy (EASE), Solar Power Europe and Wind Europe have together called on the European Commission to recognise energy storage’s crucial role for the security of energy supply in Europe.

The four organisations say that without rapidly scaling up energy storage technologies, “the EU will be unable to achieve a net-zero power system, risking continued exposure to volatile fossil energy markets”.

The open letter said the EU urgently needs a massive and rapid rollout of energy storage solutions, pointing out that most of today’s grid balancing is being done by carbon-emitting resources like gas-fired power plants. It recommends making energy storage a political priority alongside renewables and lays out three actions the Commission can take.

The first is to set energy storage targets for 2030 as part of the REPowerEU plan in May just as has been done for renewables and hydrogen. Governments should provide visibility on national roadmaps and actions for the development of storage.

Next, they want the Commission to promote the uptake of energy storage technologies. One way would be to extend the Contracts for Difference under the Innovation Fund to cover energy storage. Another would be to provide guidance on the design of standalone and colocated renewables+storage tenders in line with EU State Aid guidelines.

Energy storage should also be made mainstream in the European Commission’s implementation of the REPowerEU action plan and in the ongoing review of the Electricity Market Design.

“It is key to identify and lift barriers to storage uptake, such as the lack of implementation of EU legislation in Member States and permitting bottlenecks,” the open letter reads.

“With the US and China strongly supporting energy storage uptake, the EU risks coming late to yet another technology trend. Europe has invested a lot in R&D, especially in long-duration energy storage. We now need to reap the benefits of these efforts by deploying storage technologies at large scale,” said Ann Mettler, Vice President Europe at Breakthrough Energy, the umbrella organisation founded by Gates and others in 2015.

Patrick Clerens, Secretary General of EASE, added: “We need to replace gas turbines that provide flexibility. And not in years: now.”

Breakthrough Energy is made up of several companies include Breakthrough Energy Ventures which has invested in long-duration energy storage technology groups such as Antora Energy, two months ago.

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Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin

Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin has signed a bill into law which creates a property tax exemption for residential and mixed-use solar energy systems up to 25 kW in size. This new law expands energy freedom for consumers and creates an additional incentive to do business in the Commonwealth.

“With his signature, Governor Youngkin has significantly strengthened customer energy choice in Virginia with a business-friendly approach to promoting the local clean economy,” states Will Giese, southeast regional director for the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA). “This new law empowers millions of Virginians to choose the energy that works for them, while increasing the value of their homes and creating certainty to attract new businesses and jobs.

“The solar industry employs over 4,000 Virginians and has helped tens of thousands of state residents lower their electricity bills by going solar,” continues Giese. “Virginia now has a home-generation tax policy that is competitive with other southern states, and companies are ready to continue growing the local economy and lowering energy costs for people across the Commonwealth. Looking ahead, SEIA will continue to be a steadfast advocate for an open and competitive solar and storage market in Virginia.”

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Terra-Gen’s 560MWh Valley Center Battery Storage Project, San Diego, California, which came online last month. Image: Terra-Gen.

Battery energy storage is load shifting up to 6GWh a day on the California ISO (CAISO) grid, storage sector manager Gabe Murtaugh told Energy-storage.news, as the operator considers a market design change linked to batteries’ state of charge (SoC).

“In February, we were routinely shifting about 6,000MWh of energy. Those numbers have been increasing as more storage is integrating onto the system,” he said.

The batteries are moving energy from low-price to high-price periods but the decarbonisation effect of this is low for now, he added:

“Today storage is mostly displacing high-price, high-emission gas resources. There are some periods of overproduction of renewables and storage is certainly absorbing some of that energy but there will be some transition years before storage is charging primarily from renewable resources.”

CAISO had just over 2.7GW of utility-scale battery energy storage systems (BESS) connected to its grid as of the end of March, up from 1.5GW last summer, and expects that to hit 4GW this summer.

“We now regularly see five-minute intervals where essentially all storage is dispatched for energy on the grid, nearly 3,000MW, and that will increase over the summer as more storage interconnects to the system.”

With a peak demand on the CAISO grid of 28,971MW in March that means storage is regularly contributing at least 10% of load at various intervals.

CAISO is also working on a new framework to allow storage to bid in to wholesale markets based on state of charge and price. It would allow operators to specify prices which are based on a battery’s state of charge, Murtaugh said.

“No other market has anything like this in place today and the storage community is really excited to see this change implemented,” he added. You can read more about this market mechanism here.

He also shared his thoughts on the investment tax credit (ITC) for colocated storage and renewable resources, which allows developers to reduce the cost of the project by 30% for combining the two. He pointed out that what this actually does is limit storage resources’ participation in and contribution to grid reliability.

“The investment tax credit for renewable resources located with on-site storage is challenging for the ISO. It does not incentivise full storage participation in the organised energy markets, but instead incentivises charging only when there is generation from the on-site solar resource.”

“If the ISO needs to charge a battery during the night for grid reliability during the morning ramp, it may not be able to because of these rules. When this is applied to most storage resources on the grid, it threatens reliability.”

“The ISO supports incentives to build storage, but also wants to ensure that these resources can be fully utilised once they are operating in the market.”

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