Bigger projects, increased synergy with renewable energy generation, better evolved business models and a forward-thinking market design have contributed to the success of battery storage in the UK, with neighbouring Ireland also showing strong signs of rapid growth.
Ireland's first grid-scale battery system was commissioned at the beginning of 2020 but was followed just a few months later by another one 10 times larger. The opportunities for further development in the country appear huge, with a grid operator willing to recognise the role energy storage can play in balancing the network.
Norwegian state-owned energy company Statkraft is to provide market access and trading optimisation for battery storage assets being developed by RWE in Ireland.
Updated 10 January 2021: "These longer-duration 2 hour systems highlight a growing recognition of battery based energy storage systems as not only super-fast but also super-robust infrastructure assets that can serve a broader range of capacity and system balancing needs for 20 years or more."
A 100MW battery storage facility in Co. Offaly in Ireland has this week been energised, having been developed as part of a partnership between local developer Lumcloon Energy and South Korea's Hanwha Group.
UK stock exchange-listed energy storage investment fund Gore Street Energy Storage Fund has applied to triple its capacity in the Republic of Ireland, up to a total of 180MW.
This article looks at the current status of each of these end-markets and where there are similarities and differences in how the markets have developed, along with future opportunities.
The island of Ireland’s battery storage pipeline has swelled to nearly 2.5GW, a new report unveiled by Energy-Storage.news publisher Solar Media can reveal. Here, the report’s author and analyst at Solar Media Lauren Cook dives into the detail and explores what’s driving that growth.
Ireland's DS3 is a "really interesting market" but there is a lack of clarity of what the enduring arrangements for procuring DS3 look like, says Statkraft Market's head of UK energy storage, Nick Heyward.
Marek Kubik, market director at Fluence, talks to Energy-Storage.news about the company’s work on the 11MW Kilathmoy battery storage project, delivered in tandem with wind giant Statkraft and Ireland’s grid operator EirGrid.
Germany-headquartered renewable energy generation company Innogy will construct its first battery storage facility in Ireland.
Statkraft is laying claim to the first utility-scale battery in the Republic of Ireland with the completion of an 11MW project.
In what is unlikely to become a regular feature of Energy-Storage.news, but seems apt nonetheless, this edition rounds up news from some of the latest behind-the-meter orchestras of small-scale resources in the past few weeks.
One of the UK’s first stock exchange-listed energy storage funds has entered into agreements to acquire a 160MW portfolio of battery storage projects in Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic.
Residents of Ballyferriter village on the Dingle Peninsula in County Kerry are to join the project this month with the installation of domestic energy storage units in 20 homes.
Ben Hill is widely known in the solar and energy storage industries as the former Trina Solar executive who drove the Chinese company towards a leading position in the European market in the days of the large-scale boom before leaving to become Tesla’s VP for Europe, Africa and the Middle East. UK start-up Solo Energy is among a number of companies he is now working with closely as an advisor.
Ireland’s DS3 flexibility market will deploy the fastest-reacting batteries in the world under an opportunity dubbed “Enhanced Frequency Response on steroids” by energy expert Felicity Jones, partner for energy storage and flexibility at UK-based consultancy Everoze.
Up to 140MW of capacity will be procured under the first ever tender for Ireland’s new frequency response and balancing programme, with projects to go live by September 2021.
Over 370MW of energy storage projects, along with 1.25GW of solar, have been successfully moved into the ‘first batch’ of projects to be processed under a new connections procedure, brought in to tackle the surging levels of smaller projects aiming to connect.
Homeowners in Ireland can now access grants worth hundreds of euros to fund the installation of solar and energy storage systems as the government launches its first micro-generation scheme for the technology.
Irish state utility ESB has confirmed its entry into the UK grid-scale energy storage market with the purchase of a 7MWh facility from developer Anesco.
A glass packaging facility in Scotland is getting a 2MW Tesla battery on a ‘no-money-down’ deal after Irish state-owned utility ESB agreed to take on the risk for raising commercial revenues from the asset.
A partnership between a local developer and South Korea’s Hanwha Group could bring two 100MW battery energy storage projects to the Midlands of Ireland, the developer, Lumcloon Energy, has confirmed.
RWE Generation is investigating the construction of a 100MW battery at its Tilbury power station in England as part of plans to convert the former coal-fired plant to a gas peaking plant.
Storage developers eyeing opportunities in Ireland’s DS3 programme will be able to bid for six-year contracts providing frequency response and reserve services in September when transmission system operator EirGrid will launch a new procurement process.
Northern Ireland’s Queens University Belfast (QUB) has found that battery-based energy storage can provide inertial response for system reliability much more efficiently, at a lower cost and with substantially reduced emissions than thermal generation. Dr Marek Kubic at Fluence, which is working with QUB, explains.
Fresh details have emerged surrounding UK-headquartered utility Centrica’s rumoured 100MW battery after a planning application was submitted to Kilkenny County Council in Ireland through a joint venture formed in part by local subsidiary Bord Gáis Energy.
Battery storage and smart technologies are to be rolled out to homes in the Irish town of Dingle as part of a new trial to test their potential to support the use of variable renewable energy supply resources and smart connection to the Irish electricity grid.
A new redox flow battery demonstration project was launched in Belfast, Northern Ireland, this week.
Microsoft is going to be the off-taker of power from a 37MW wind power project in Europe, trialling the use of integrated battery energy storage to trade the energy.