Statoil has awarded a contract to Younicos to deliver a 1 MW battery storage system for Hywind Scotland, what Statoil calls the world’s first floating offshore wind farm.
The storage solution, named Batwind, will be operational starting in the second quarter of next year. Batwind is a partnership between Statoil and Masdar.
The Younicos battery will be taught when to hold back and store electricity and when to send power to the grid, thus increasing the value of the power from the wind project. The two 10-foot, modular battery containers will be placed at the Hywind Scotland onshore substation in Peterhead, Scotland.
“As part of Statoil’s strategy of gradually supplementing our oil and gas portfolio with profitable renewable energy, getting to understand energy storage is important,” says Sebastian Bringsværd, head of Hywind development for Statoil. “With more renewables coming into production, it will be crucial to handle storage to ensure predictable energy supply in periods without wind or sun. Batwind has the potential to add value by mitigating periods without wind – and by that making wind a more reliable energy producer year-round. This could expand the use and market for wind and renewables in the future.”
Whereas a standard battery will charge and re-charge, the purpose of the Batwind storage solution project is to understand how a battery can help increase the value of the produced electricity and how a battery can best work with the wind farm and the grid, explains Statoil.
Hywind Scotland is operated by Statoil on behalf of partner Masdar. Statoil holds an ownership share of 75%, and Masdar holds 25%.
Based on the testing of the system, Statoil and Masdar will assess next steps in further developing the solution. Younicos also recently completed the installation and commissioning of an upgraded 3 MW battery-based energy storage system on Kodiak Island, Alaska, which is almost completely powered by renewable energy.
Please note that “1MWh” Batwind is not going “to add value by mitigating periods without wind – and by that making wind a more reliable energy producer year-round” in this context but rather it is a grossly inadequate capacity of energy storage for any 30MW wind farm. My recommendation is for energy storage of 5 hours times the generation capacity – so 5 hours x 30MW = 150MWh. It doesn’t have to be exactly “150MWh”. The configuration rows in my calculator http://scottish.scienceontheweb.net/Wind%20power%20storage%20back-up%20calculator.htm?wind=30#wind range from 144MWh to 160MWh. But just to be clear. That’s someone in Statoil who thinks “1MWh” is… Read more »