Digitalized Gas Plants and Battery Storage on the Grid: Integration,
Collaboration, Competition, and Implications for Cost Saving, Dealing with
Demand Spikes, and Optimizing Gas Peakers
Green Tech Media just put out an interesting analysis of the
integration of digitalized gas peaker plants and energy storage, typically
lithium-ion based batteries, for dealing with peak demand at low cost. General
Electric (GE) is leading the charge at digitalizing the gas plants so they can
have faster response times and automated switching. Linked here:
GE recommends full digitalization of utility generation
sources through their ‘asset performance management (APM) system’ and their
Predix platform. From the article:
“Digitally assisted, flexible gas plants can handle both
peak power and grid stability, calling into question the need for lithium-ion
in those roles, said Niloy Sanyal, chief marketing officer for GE Power
Digital, in an interview at the company's San Ramon campus.”
Advantages to this are that the often under-utilized gas
peaker plants can be better utilized and optimized giving them better
economics. Storage advocates claim building new gas peaker plants could become
stranded assets. While lower storage costs do make an economic case against
building new gas peaker plants, digitalizing existing ones makes even better
economic sense.
The near-instantaneous response time gives batteries an
advantage and the gas peakers take several minutes to fire up. However, with
good predictive software it can be known in advance when they will be needed.
Small storage can be added to existing peaker plants for near-instantaneous
response times giving the plants the minutes needed to come on-line. Sanyal
pointed out that storage by itself is better for certain applications like
storing peak mid-day solar generation for evening use.
Small and often under-utilized gas peaker plants are
utilized around the world as necessary back-up for intermittent and
unpredictable solar and wind generation. Digitalizing them and equipping them
with small battery storage allows them to have the response-time of
utility-scale battery storage and improves their economics by increasing their
utilization and capacity factors. The batteries serve as a ‘ramping resource,’
allowing the gas peaker plant to be responsive to short-time (5-15 min) power
demands. Overall, this makes grid integration of renewables cheaper for
utilities by providing flexibility. One might see it as a symbiosis of sorts.
AES Energy Storage notes that 1 MW of battery storage provides 2 MW of
flexibility. However, with digital hybrid gas plants a smaller amount of storage
can provide even more flexibility.
Also mentioned in the article is another factor –
incentives. Renewable standards and goals as well as energy efficiency
standards incentivize batteries and other storage for utilities. This gives
storage by itself an advantage in some areas. Utilities will need to compare
their incentivized savings from adding storage to the savings from more
optimized digital gas plants. This will likely be the competitive aspect.
GE and SoCal Edison just turned on this spring two of these
hybrid electric gas turbine plants in California. They are small at 50 MW. The
batteries can provide up to 10 MW and 4 MWh of power. They set these up in a
hurry to help deal with the Aliso Canyon gas storage field being off-line. What
is fascinating is that these fully digital/automated hybrid plants are
complementary – the limitation of batteries is that they can only run for a
short time before needing to be recharged while the limitations of the gas
plants are that they need a little time to start up (even though they are
considered ‘quick-start’ compared to older gas plants or even slower to start
coal plants). The digitally controlled hybridization with coordinated control
systems overcomes both limitations for seamless operation. SCE also noted that
digital controls and associated equipment can drastically reduce water
consumption and fuel consumption thus reducing pollution and greenhouse gas
emissions as well. This is cutting edge technology at the grid edge!
References:
GE Digital Gas Plants vs. Utility-Scale Batteries – by Julian Spector,
in Green Tech Media, Aug. 3, 2017
The Emerging Boom in Utility-Wide Asset Analytics – by Jeff St. John,
in Green Tech Media, Feb. 21, 2014
Inside GE and SoCal Edison’s First-of-a-Kind Hybrid Peaker Plant with
Batteries and Gas Turbines – by Jeff St. John, in Green Tech Media, April 18,
2017
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