GridBeyond backs financial benefits of community batteries

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GridBeyond, an Irish company that leverages the power of artificial intelligence (AI) to optimise the performance of renewable energy assets, says an efficiently coordinated community-owned battery with 1 MW storage capacity could generate up to $250,000 (USD 168,650) in revenue each year.

In a new white paper, GridBeyond said community-scale storage, typically between 100 kWh and 5 MWh of energy storage capacity, has found a sweet spot in the gap between home and utility scale batteries.

“Community-scale storage has the potential to combine the scale advantages of large storage projects with the network, resilience and direct consumer benefits that can only be achieved from distributed projects,” the company said.

“Battery storage of this scale offers benefits over household batteries, including lower costs and increased ability to integrate more solar PV energy generation.”

The Dublin-based company said community-scale storage could also achieve significant net value through stacking multiple services, earning the operators a “valuable income stream and realising attractive payback and return on investment opportunities.”

“Community-scale storage could provide significant net value by stacking multiple value streams while also achieving economies of scale,” GridBeyond said.

The company, which entered the Australian market in 2022, estimates that a 1 MW community-owned battery participating in the frequency control ancillary services (FCAS) and arbitrage markets could generate $250,000 per year in revenue for its owners.

This result is dependent upon siting the batteries in high-value locations on the grid and being able to monetise the value they bring, GridBeyond said.

“For community batteries to be commercially viable, an intelligent energy storage management system (ESMS) platform must be interoperable between a grid operator’s system, grid edge control layer, and energy market interfaces,” it said, noting that the ESMS must be able to co-optimise across value streams to deliver benefits across the entire energy stakeholder ecosystem.

“By pairing sophisticated battery hardware with predictive energy storage and flexibility management software, asset operators can optimise value in real time.”

The Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO) has projected that 49 GW / 646 GWh of dispatchable energy storage will be required in the National Electricity Market by 2050 to meet future energy needs and demands.

In its 2024 Integrated System Plan published earlier this year, AEMO estimates grid-scale solar and wind in Australia will see a six-fold increase to 127 GW, and distributed PV will increase four-fold to 86 GW by the middle of this century.

AEMO said firming capacity, including dispatchable storage, virtual power plants and pumped hydro, will also need to increase significantly, rising from about 3 MW now to 22 GW by 2030 and 49 GW by the mid-century point.

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