South Australia-headquartered Epic Energy said construction of the 100 MW / 200 MWh Mannum battery energy storage project is now complete and the system has moved into the commissioning phase.
The battery, built alongside Epic’s 35 MW Mannum solar farms about 60 kilometres east of state capital Adelaide, officially entered the energy market operator’s Market Management System (MMS) last month. That milestone signalled the beginning of testing and commissioning to ensure the system performs reliably under market and network conditions as per the agreed Generator Performance Standard (GPS).
Epic Chief Executive Officer Clive D’Cruz said the Mannum battery is due to be operational later this year and will provide vital flexibility to support Australia’s ongoing clean energy transition while increasing grid resilience.
“In May, the Mannum BESS achieved the necessary registration with the Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO), which then signals the project’s move into the commissioning phase,” D’Cruz said.
“Commissioning involves extensive testing which is closely coordinated in conjunction with AEMO and ElectraNet. We expect this will take a number of months to complete before the BESS begins commercial operations later in the year.”
Once operational, the battery – part of Epic’s Mannum Energy Park that also includes two solar farms with a combined 35 MW generation capacity – will be able to send 100 MW of power into the electricity grid for up to two hours, enough to power about 16,000 South Australian homes.
D’Cruz said the battery will absorb surplus energy when demand is low and direct it into the grid to help support the consistent supply of renewable electricity to South Australian consumers, and the national grid, when demand peaks.
“We are excited to see this project moving towards operations and being a valuable part of the South Australian energy market and the Mannum community,” he said.
Commissioning has also commenced on the 111 MW / 285 MWh Templers battery energy storage system located near Gawler, about 45 km northeast of Adelaide.
Recently acquired by ZEBRE, a joint venture between South Australia-headquartered gen-tailer Zen Energy and Taiwan’s HD Renewable Energy (HDRE), the Templers battery is expected to commence full commercial operations later this year.
Once complete, the project will be one of the largest battery energy storage systems in South Australia.
The largest will be French independent power producer Neoen’s 238.5 MW/ 477 MWh Blyth battery system, that entered commissioning in April.
This content is protected by copyright and may not be reused. If you want to cooperate with us and would like to reuse some of our content, please contact: editors@pv-magazine.com.
By submitting this form you agree to pv magazine using your data for the purposes of publishing your comment.
Your personal data will only be disclosed or otherwise transmitted to third parties for the purposes of spam filtering or if this is necessary for technical maintenance of the website. Any other transfer to third parties will not take place unless this is justified on the basis of applicable data protection regulations or if pv magazine is legally obliged to do so.
You may revoke this consent at any time with effect for the future, in which case your personal data will be deleted immediately. Otherwise, your data will be deleted if pv magazine has processed your request or the purpose of data storage is fulfilled.
Further information on data privacy can be found in our Data Protection Policy.