Jesse Remillard, ERS, for Zondits
Southern California is becoming a high-stakes testing ground for utility-scale battery energy storage. The energy storage provider AES has secured two contracts totaling 37.5 MW (150 MWh) that will be critical for San Diego Gas and Electric (SDG&E) to meet its peak demands.
The AES press release states that the two storage projects will be installed at SDG&E substations, with 30 MW to be installed in Escondido and 7.5 MW in El Cajon. A third project, to be installed in Mira Loma for Southern California Edison (SCE) by Tesla, will have a power rating of 20 MW and an energy storage capacity of 80 MWh. The 30 MW/120 MWh installation by AES would be the largest lithium ion battery installation in the US.
These projects come in response to a massive gas leak in 2015 at the Aliso Canyon natural gas reservoir, where the equivalent emissions of 1.7 million cars for the course of a year were released. This disaster resulted in large natural gas shortages, and led to the California Public Utilities Commission issuing a mandate for accelerated procurement of energy storage.
The intent is that these large battery systems will take the place of natural gas power plants used to meet peak electric loads, and AES will be responsible for making sure the batteries perform for 10 years.
Some utilities, such as Xcel, believe that battery technology isn’t quite mature enough for such large-scale and critical projects. Depending on how these “proof of concept” projects perform, there could be large-scale economic ramifications across the nation regarding investment in battery energy storage.
AES is currently working on a deal for an even larger 300 MW project in Long Beach that is intended to replace an aging gas plant in the area. The new project, which could be the largest electric energy storage facility in the world, is slated to come online in 2020. Its fate could depend on the performance of the projects currently being installed in Escondido, El Cajon, and Mira Loma.
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A Big Test for Big Batteries
The New York Times, January 14, 2017
Energy regulators needed a quick fix.
But rather than sticking with gas, they turned to a technology more closely associated with flashlights: batteries. They freed up the utilities to start installing batteries — and lots of them.
It is a solution that’s audacious and risky. The idea is that the batteries can store electricity during daylight hours (when the state’s many solar panels are flooding the grid with power), then release it as demand peaks (early evening, when people get home). In effect, the rechargeable batteries are like an on-demand power plant, and, in theory, able to replace an actual plant.
Utilities have been studying batteries nationwide. But none have moved ahead with the gusto of those in southern California.
This idea has far-reaching potential. But the challenge of storing electricity has vexed engineers, researchers, policy makers and entrepreneurs for centuries. Even as countless technologies have raced ahead, batteries haven’t yet fulfilled their promise.
And the most powerful new designs come with their own risks, such as fire or explosion if poorly made or maintained. It’s the same problem that forced Samsung to recall 2.5 million Galaxy Note 7 smartphones in September because of fire risk.
After racing for months, engineers here in California have brought three energy-storage sites close to completion to begin serving the Southern California electric grid within the next month. They are made up of thousands of oversize versions of the lithium-ion batteries now widely used in smartphones, laptop computers and other digital devices.
One of the installations, at a San Diego Gas & Electric operations center surrounded by industrial parks in Escondido, Calif., 30 miles north of San Diego, will be the largest of its kind in the world, developers say. It represents the most crucial test yet of an energy-storage technology that many experts see as fundamental to a clean-energy future.
Here, about 130 miles southeast of Aliso Canyon, the site of the immense gas leak in 2015 — the global-warming equivalent of operating about 1.7 million cars over the course of a year — 19,000 battery modules the size of a kitchen drawer are being wired together in racks. They will operate out of two dozen beige, 640-square-foot trailers.