The dismantling of conventional power stations and the increased input of renewable energies means that new, more flexible energy response solutions are required. This is because supply from various generation sources may lead to too much or too little energy being fed into the energy supply network depending on the situation, entailing problems. For the British network operator, National Grid, ways of providing a rapid, sub-second frequency response are required in order to maintain a constant frequency of 50 Hz within the network. Battery energy storage systems such as those supplied by the RES Group in Europe are ideal for this purpose: they collect superfluous energy and restore it to the network within a fraction of a second should an under-supply occur.
Contracts of 55 MW with National Grid
RES has now been awarded a four-year contract to provide frequency response services to the National Grid network with the help of a 35 MW lithium-ion battery energy storage system. Following the 20 MW battery energy storage contract which RES also signed with the British network operator in May, this contract once again ranks as one of the largest battery energy storage projects in Europe.
Enhanced sub-second frequency response
“RES Group has already implemented numerous energy storage projects for network services in the USA and Canada. The contract with National Grid now represents another important step in bringing our world-leading expertise to Great Britain as well as the whole of Europe”, explained Rob Sauven, Group Business Development Director at RES. The contract won by RES is part of National Grid's call for tenders for a total of eight enhanced sub-second frequency response projects. In total, 37 different providers from 64 unique sites submitted a bid. The entire contract amounts to a volume of approximately 80 million euros. The contract won by RES was the most extensive of the eight.
Germany as a future market
The project awarded in Great Britain represents a pioneering step for the further development of system services within the European energy storage market. For RES in Germany, too, successfully winning such a large project is an important milestone in driving forward the use of battery energy storage systems in the domestic market. “As a result of their increased precision of control and speed of response, our battery energy storage systems react in a much more efficient way than the conventional power stations which have up until now been used for frequency response services in Europe. The provision of response services will become more important in Germany, too, thanks to its high economic efficiency and the continuing process of phasing out conventional energy sources”, said Dr. Matthias Leuthold, Head of Energy Storage at RES in Germany.
In addition to battery energy storage-related projects, RES also offers its own RESolve software, which it has specifically developed and which adapts the operation of the storage system to the individual requirements of the situation at hand and guarantees optimum monitoring and control. (HCN)
Related news:
https://www.pveurope.eu/solar-storage/energy-storage-costs-prices-and-finance-glance
