Solar Power World asked Dean Middleton, director of sales for renewable energy at Trojan Battery Co., to tell us about trends in solar power storage. He says Ah capacity flooded batteries are the company’s top seller for renewable energy systems. Here’s what else he said:
SPW: When it comes to the technology, what is the overarching trend in solar batteries?
Middletown: Batteries are key components in many PV applications and should be high-capacity and deep-cycle to provide reliable energy storage. Selecting the correct technology, type and vendor play an important part in establishing a successful battery-based energy storage system.
A trend now in the industry is the move away from using automotive batteries, which are designed to simply provide a short burst of energy to start a car, and away from floating AGM batteries. Batteries are built with specific duty cycles in mind. Batteries designed for a renewable energy application must have high deep-cycle life, with an emphasis on energy rather than power, analogous to a marathon runner who has to pace herself to cover a very long distance. Therefore, the first task of the renewable energy battery buyer is to make sure the battery selected is designed for cycling applications.
Another trend is that the industry is reconsidering initial thoughts on the use of lithium batteries and continuing to focus on the use of lead acid batteries. Lead acid batteries feature proven technology and are much more affordable.
What product of yours demonstrates a trend in your market?
Trojan’s Industrial, Premium and Signature lines of advanced FLA deep-cycle batteries, as well as Trojan’s AGM and gel batteries, are optimized for renewable energy applications. Batteries in these systems tend to operate in partial states of charge for extended periods of time, and Trojan batteries have been designed to provide maximum life under these conditions.
Trojan’s Industrial line of larger Ah capacity flooded batteries has become our most popular product line since it was introduced in 2011, and we intend to introduce more sizes in 2013 to meet growing market demand. The trend towards larger Ah battery banks is evident in the U.S. for larger off-grid homes as in the developing world for rural electrification programs that increasingly use centralized mini-grids to serve rural communities.
What will the future of solar batteries be like?
Ease of maintenance and total cost of ownership will always be deciding factors when purchasing deep-cycle batteries for renewable energy systems. To simplify maintenance, Trojan has introduced a series of single-point watering systems which offer customers a way to maintain our FLA batteries and ensure maximum battery life.
To facilitate the need for larger Ah capacity battery bank configurations, Trojan Battery Company will expand its line of Industrial 2V FLA battery models. The introduction of larger 2V Industrial products will allow system designers more flexibility to implement larger capacity systems while minimizing parallel connections.
What challenges does this market segment face going forward?
The grid-tied PV market is highly vulnerable to shifts in government and utility policy. Without subsidies and incentives, grid-tied PV systems have a long payback period and without them the market potential is very limited.
By contrast, off-grid systems typically provide power in remote areas that have no other cost-effective option for power. Under these conditions, we don’t think in terms of a “payback period” as we do with grid-tied systems. Under these circumstances, off-grid systems often are the only cost-effective power solution and have essentially paid for themselves from the day they are installed and operational.
The market opportunity there is significant, but not without challenges. The emergence of newer companies that have limited off-grid experience, combined with continued competitive pressures of lower quality products from China, mean that we need to continually educate our customers on why true cycle life performance is the single most important factor when selecting a deep-cycle battery.
Allen Rainey says
Good overall view of batteries in current state (of charge). Larger, more AH batteries are the trend in our installations, especially in Haiti – where solar and battery backup are mandatory to achieve 24/7 power. The smaller batteries (T105) cycle every day in representative systems. If sized correctly (daily discharge to ~50%) batteries can last 8-10 years easily (with proper watering and equalization).
Appreciative Female in Solar says
“analogous to a marathon runner who has to pace HERSELF to cover a very long distance”
Kudos author. Nice use of the feminine pronoun here.