UK grid power balance to get support from 10MW battery

Image credit: energy-storage.news

As the advance of subsidised renewables makes new gas or coal fired power stations ever less economic to build and operate, one of the supposed answers to the artificially created reliability problem is to add batteries to help ‘balance’ the grid. Of course this will also be expensive, and only marginally useful as batteries don’t generate their own power, but that’s just an issue for bill-paying consumers in the privatised UK energy system.

A battery installation at a UK biomass power plant is making news this month says TechXplore . Supporters call it an important recognition of the “enormous potential for battery solutions” in the UK.

The company is E.ON. The challenge, as they attempt to meet it, is doing their bit to balance the grid.

“Power supply and demand on the UK grid have to be matched closely in real-time to maintain a safe frequency so household electrical appliances function properly,” said their company press release. “Balancing the grid is becoming more challenging because the growing range of renewable generation sources make the electricity system less stable and more prone to changes in frequency.”

A 10MW lithium-ion battery has been installed and connected to the grid at the Blackburn Meadows biomass plant near Sheffield. The facility is next to an existing power plant, said The Guardian.

The E.ON release said the Blackburn Meadows plant is a 30MW renewable energy plant that can produce enough power for around 40,000 homes. The energy storage project is aimed to help keep power supplies stable, supporting the range of power sources feeding into the UK’s national grid.

The Guardian said the facility, run by E.ON, will help the UK grid cope with fast-growing amount of renewable energy. Yes, you may consider this a giant battery. The battery is housed in four 40ft-long shipping containers.

E.ON said the battery has the same power as roughly 100 family cars and holds the same amount of energy as 500,000 mobile phone batteries. The Guardian said the Blackburn Meadows battery is one of the biggest in Britain so far.

The battery initiative is in response to a request from National Grid, said Adam Vaughan, The Guardian energy correspondent, for contracts to help it keep electricity supply and demand in balance— a grid challenge “as more intermittent wind and solar comes online.”

Continued here.