Peak Shaving – A potential
Energy Storage Application
One of the biggest challenges for power utilities in the GCC today is to
keep up with the ever growing peak power demand resulting from a
general demand growth and more specifically air conditioning loads
during summer. It forces power utilities to invest in additional power
generation capacity and related infrastructure to avoid power cuts during
times of mid-day peak demand caused by ambient temperatures
exceeding 50?C.
Cost effective large scale energy storage solutions
energy storage systems, work particularly well in
would not only allow power utilities to reduce
power applications such as Frequency Support or
investments in additional power generation installed
Primary Reserve services that require fast response
capacity but also improve the utilization of existing
and the capability to deliver proportionally high
assets and fuel efficiency. Even so the idea of
amounts of power over short periods of time. A
utilizing large scale energy storage systems for
typical
peak shaving or to support demand response, make
example is the NEC Energy Solutions, Los
perfect sense, at present however there is no
Angamos project in Chile that can deliver 32MW
significant grid connected energy storage system
within 20ms. However, what affects the economics
installed base in any of the GCC countries yet.
of battery based systems for large scale GWh size
There is however a noticeable growing interest in
applications is that the system cost increases
the region for large scale energy storage solutions
almost proportionally to system design capacity
for peak shaving and to mitigate the potential
which makes it difficult to make economics work
impact
beyond the 100MWh energy storage capacity mark.
of
renewables.
Following
are
some
interesting facts:
Li-Ion battery systems application for
With a predicted annual price reduction of around
15% the economics for large scale grid connected
Elon Musk’s Powerwall recently made headlines
battery based energy storage is expected to
and has been hailed as the solution that will replace
improve over time but for now batteries are still not
conventional fossil fuel based power generation in
really a commercially viable solution when it comes
the foreseeable future. The problem however is that
to large scale energy storage in the GWh range as
battery based energy storage at a current market
required for peak shaving.
price of approx. 430 US$ per kWh energy storage
capacity (based on Powerwall wholesale prices)
The good news is that batteries are not the only
maybe attractive to some individual house owners
solution. Pumped hydro energy storage for example
but not for large scale applications in the GWh
is an efficient, cost effective and well proven grid
range. In today’s energy market, the economics for
connected energy storage technology, provided that
large MWh scale grid connected battery based
geological formations (mountains) are available.
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The most important cost factors that determine the
of pumping the water up a mountain, it is used to lift
economic feasibility are the grid connection and
a large rock, which has been cut out of the ground.
water
related infrastructural construction cost.
The hydraulic rock system is specifically well suited
Identification of suitable locations which require a
for large scale energy storage systems in the GWh
minimum in infrastructure related investment is key
range as the cost per kWh energy storage installed
in the successful development of commercially
capacity is dropping by 75% when the size is
viable pump hydro energy storage systems. Finding
doubled while at the same time energy storage
suitable locations however might prove more
capacity increases by a factor 16. The estimated
challenging than one might expect. An innovative
total cost of approx. 150 US$ per installed kWh
alternative hydro based energy storage design
energy storage installed capacity for a system with
called “Hydraulic Rock” recently developed by
total design capacity of 8GWh is good news for the
Heindl Energy is drastically reducing the challenge
energy storage and renewable energy industry and
to find the right location by literally putting the
might eventually help to make large scale peak
classic pump hydro concept upside down. Instead
shaving in the GCC a reality.
About Claudio Palmieri
Claudio Palmieri is the CEO CLS Energy Consultants at The Dubai Multi Commodities Centre (DMCC) and a
Technical Director at Clean Energy Business Council (CEBC). He has worked in commissioning, engineering,
project management, service, sales, project development and business development for power, renewable
energy and Oil & Gas for companies like ABB, MTU and Kharafi National, which included a position on the board
of directors of a Solar PV EPC company registered at Masdar, Abu Dhabi.
© Capital Business 2015
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