BIG BET ON BATTERIES
California to test whether big batteries can stop summer blackouts.
With summer’s heat approaching, California’s plan for avoiding a repeat of last year’s blackouts hinges on a humble savior — the battery.
Giant versions of the same technology that powers smartphones and cars are being plugged into the state’s electrical grid at breakneck speed, with California set to add more battery capacity this year than all of China, according to BloombergNEF.
It will be the biggest test yet of whether batteries are reliable enough to sustain a grid largely powered by renewables. Last year, when the worst heat wave in a generation taxed California’s power system and plunged millions into darkness in the first rolling blackouts since the Enron crisis, many blamed the state’s aggressive clean-energy push and its reliance on solar power. Should a heat wave strike again this summer, it will be up to batteries save the day.
Their success or failure may even have implications for President Joe Biden’s ambitious plan to achieve a carbon-free electricity system by 2035 — which would require massive battery deployment and the expansion of renewable energy systems across the nation. Biden’s longawaited infrastructure plan, unveiled this week, includes a tax credit for grid-scale batteries, according to U.S. Energy Storage Association. They’re part of his larger effort not just to shift to renewable power but to make the aging electric grid more reliable.
“This is going to be the preview summer for batteries in California, and we want to make sure this initial chapter is as successful as possible,’’ said Elliot Mainzer, chief executive officer of the California Independent System Operator, which runs the grid across most of the state.
By this August, the state will have 1,700 megawatts of new battery capacity — enough to power 1.3 million homes and, in theory, avert a grid emergency on the scale of last year’s.
It won’t be easy. The state’s plan to eliminate greenhouse gas emissions by 2045 may require installing 48.8 gigawatts of energy storage, according to a report by three state agencies — more than five times the output of all the grid-scale batteries currently operating worldwide.
But batteries do have two major limitations — time and cost. Most of the battery packs now available are designed to run for just four hours at a stretch. While that makes them a good fit for California, where electricity supplies can be strained in early summer evenings after solar power shuts down, batteries would not have prevented the multi-day outage that paralyzed Texas in February. A battery can only operate for so long before it needs to recharge.
“If batteries last four hours, then that’s not really going to do the job,’’ said Kit Konolige, senior analyst with Bloomberg Intelligence. “It’s still somewhat unproven, using batteries for a large portion of capacity.’’
Still, California sees batteries as a key part of its grid’s future. Not only are they a lot faster to permit and build, batteries can generate income by letting owners arbitrage power prices, charging when electricity is cheap and discharging when it’s expensive. They also offer other grid services like stabilizing voltage throughout the day.
“There’s been enough deployment around the world and operating history that utilities seem to be comfortable with it,’’ said energy consultant Mike Florio, a former member of the California Public Utilities Commission. “It seems like the performance has been as expected, if not better.’’
But will batteries prevent blackouts? So far, they’ve been credited with helping prevent outages elsewhere, most notably in Australia where Tesla has built a 150-megawatt lithiumion installation. That bodes well for California, where the buildout in combination with other measures should give the state enough of a cushion to prevent blackouts this summer, according to Konolige.
Just in case, the state has also delayed the planned closure of some gas plants and beefed up “demand response’’ programs. Public officials — including Gov. Gavin Newsom, facing a likely recall election — have a powerful incentive not to get caught short two years in a row.
“It would be an ugly situation to run into something similar to last summer,’’ Konolige said. “To me, that’s a strong indicator that it’s unlikely to happen this year.’’