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Energy Systems Engineering masters student at University College Dublin with an interest in electric cars, rare earth metals and energy.
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  • Review of Energy Storage Market Forecasts 2 comments
    Sep 1, 2009 05:45 PM | about stocks: ABAT, ALTI, AXPW.OB, HEV, ENS, ZBB, VLNC, ULBI, ACPW, BCON
    There is a lot of buzz surrounding energy storage at the moment. In my previous instablog I argued that storage is not needed to integrate renewables onto the grid. Further excellent discussion on the same question can be found here: Does Wind Need Energy Storage? Nevertheless there are other opportunities for storage, notably as an enabler of the smart grid. As such, many people are trying to forecast the future market potential of this area. Three prominent examples are:
    Energy Storage Technology Markets Pike Research (June 2009) [$3,500]
     
    A simplified, composite, view of their forecasts is presented below:
     

     
    After reading the executive summaries linked above, if you feel like dropping a few thousand bills on a report, you should go for the GreenTechMedia report.
     
    The Nanomarkets report appears quite woeful. Take for instance the following excerpt:
     
    “As the percent of wind and solar on a grid passes above 10–15 percent instabilities can occur if there is no storage capacity. In fact, Ireland put a moratorium on the connection of new wind power to their national grid due to instabilities as the wind generating capacity exceeded 7% of overall grid capacity.”

    You could be forgiven for thinking Ireland abandoned wind. The moratorium referenced was for 6 months in 2003 when Ireland had 211MW of wind and was just getting to grips with wind integration. Today Ireland has 1,161MW which is actually 15% of grid capacity. Ireland is in fact aiming for 40% wind penetration with no storage.

    The Pike Research report states:

    “While pumped hydro and CAES should persist as options and gobble up large amounts of dollars for a small number of projects, advanced Li-ion batteries will be the volume leader and the one technology with a clear and possibly astronomical growth trajectory.”
     
    Although generally reasonable, the report seems to place a bizarre emphasis on lithium-ion for grid storage. This is at variance with much reasoned analysis; see John Petersen’s articles for example.
     
    Finally the GreenTechMedia report seems to be the only one written by an expert in the area – John Kluza holds a masters in engineering from MIT and actually worked at a storage company (A123). Of the three, I recommend this report.
     
    The buzz about storage should, however, be tempered by the following quote from GreenTechMedia’s free SmartGrid report (July 2009):
    “Unlike other sectors that will continue to grow step by step; a breakthrough in storage is still needed.”

    Disclosure: No Positions

    Themes: Alternative Energy, Storage, Renewables, Wind, Solar, Carbon, Global Warming, Flywheels, Batteries Stocks: ABAT, ALTI, AXPW.OB, HEV, ENS, ZBB, VLNC, ULBI, ACPW, BCON
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This post has 2 comments:

  •  
    At a recent ERCOT meeting, participants seemed to be of the impression that the IBM study was "optimistic" -- and that more regulation will be needed than the study assumes. Also, there seems to be a push to raise the interconnection requirements for wind projects.
    Sep 15 01:19 PM | Link | Reply
  •  
    The question of Wind 'needing' storage covers a multitude of issues. Wind plants are built when they are profitable for the investors, tax credits and all. The profitability comes directly from the PPAs. The PPAs for wind farms are remarkably low, as it is the utility that takes the risk on buying wind energy that mostly (in the central wind corridor) comes in at night.. the low load period. Storage can make wind and other renewables a standard dispatchable generator, and therefore higher PPAs, and therefore more Wind Energy built and integrated.
    Oct 01 01:48 PM | Link | Reply
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