Alliant Energy, the U.S. Department of Energy and the Iowa Economic Development Authority are jointly supporting a battery-storage solution in Decorah, Iowa that aims to connect customer-owned solar while maintaining reliable electrical service across the community.
Battery storage is needed in Decorah because one electric circuit that serves the community will start to reach capacity as more customer-owned renewables are added. Until now, energy companies have had to either upgrade the grid in a community, and take on those added costs, or restrict the number of solar arrays that could be added in one area. Using battery storage to meet this challenge is just one of many applications which may lower customer costs.
“By working hand in hand with renewables, energy storage can contribute towards creating a cost-effective, resilient and greener grid,” said Imre Gyuk, energy storage program manager, DOE Office of Electricity. “We are pleased to be joining Alliant Energy in this project which will serve as a model for the entire country.”
The project is backed by a $250,000 cost-share from the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Electricity (DOE-OE) and a $200,000 grant from the Iowa Economic Development Authority (IEDA). The battery will sit on land Alliant Energy leases from Decorah.
“This battery project is a game-changer in Decorah,“ said Terry Kouba, president of Alliant Energy Iowa. “We’re installing it on a circuit that’s near capacity for solar. Using batteries can add critical capacity and may save our customers money, because a battery costs a fraction of the total to upgrade our system.”
Sandia National Laboratories is providing technical support for the project and will collect operational data. This data is critical to inform DOE’s national energy storage research as part of the DOE-OE Stationary Energy Storage Program under the direction of Gyuk. Sandia’s assistance will help to ensure that the Decorah battery is sized, integrated and operated optimally to provide the most economic benefits. Iowa State University will also study the project.
“Energy storage technology presents immense opportunity to further harness and complement the state’s renewable energy resources and to foster a more efficient and resilient electric grid,” said Debi Durham, Director of IEDA and the Iowa Finance Authority. “The shared involvement by such a diverse and talented mix of partners is sure to make this project a model for lessons learned and for similar future initiatives.”
The 2.5-MW, 2.922-MWh battery will serve as an “electron bank” to store excess solar power. It will store energy during the daytime and then release it in the evening when demand for electricity peaks. It will also provide valuable insight into the challenges of providing reliable and affordable electricity in areas with a concentration of customer-owned solar. Lessons learned from the Decorah pilot will inform similar future battery projects.
DOE-OE conducts jointly supported federal-state energy storage deployment projects across the United States, with systems in numerous states including Massachusetts, Oregon, Hawaii, Vermont, New Mexico and Alaska, and also supports state energy storage policy development.
Technical support for state storage projects and policy is provided through Sandia National Laboratories, which administers the Energy Storage Technology Advancement Partnership (ESTAP) with the assistance of the Clean Energy States Alliance (CESA). For more information about ESTAP, visit https://www.cesa.org/projects/energy-storage-technology-advancement-partnership/
“CESA is pleased to be part of this collaborative effort to bring a battery storage solution to Decorah, Iowa. Battery storage offers great value to Midwestern states. We hope this project will help to demonstrate that value, and that Alliant and other utilities in the region will learn from the Decorah project how to maximize value for this and future energy storage deployments,” said Todd Olinsky-Paul, senior project director at the CESA.
The Decorah energy storage project is expected to be complete and in service by the end of 2020. It will be the company’s third battery storage project in Iowa. Alliant Energy has a smaller battery in a similar application near Wellman. It is also adding a battery to store energy from the company’s solar garden in Marshalltown.
A free DOE webinar on the project will be offered on July 30 at 12:00 p.m. CDT.
News item from Alliant Energy
“Battery storage is needed in Decorah because one electric circuit that serves the community will start to reach capacity as more customer-owned renewables are added. Until now, energy companies have had to either upgrade the grid in a community, and take on those added costs, or restrict the number of solar arrays that could be added in one area. Using battery storage to meet this challenge is just one of many applications which may lower customer costs.”
This is the type of “partnership” residential and small business solar PV and or wind generation needs to make the local grid more robust and reactive to local energy needs. Grid efficiency is not always tapped in a positive way. There are still many places the town feeder is barely adequate to service the electric needs of the town during high demand times of the day. But at night capacity on the feeder may be very low, less than 50% and probably sometimes reaching 25% capacity in the late evening, early morning hours. That would be a great time to arbitrage off peak utility energy, store it for the next days early morning needs until solar PV starts making useful energy for the day.