Renewables based systems are reducing blackouts in UK and USA!
The truth is gradually emerging that far from threatening electricity transmission systems with blackouts, renewable energy-based systems are preventing them for occurring! This has a lot to do with the fact that the installation of batteries to deal with renewable output variability has the side-effect of improving grid resilience. Solar power is also reducing possibilities for blackouts in hot places.
Batteries stopped widespread blackouts just three days ago, on October 8th in the UK, when, the UK-Norwegian electricity interconnector suddenly crashed leading to a loss of 1.4 GW of power. Without rapid action, frequency levels would have fallen leading to widespread blackouts as the system tried to preserve grid stability. But 1.5 GW of batteries rapidly clicked into service saving the day (see HERE). Of course the build-up of batteries in the UK is only happening because of the growth of renewable energy!
Similar stories of how blackouts are being averted are coming from other places with growing renewables penetration, including Texas and California in the USA. In both cases, earlier blackouts were caused by conventional power system problems, but widely blamed on renewables by anti-renewables lobbies. But now as renewables, and battery systems, proliferate further, blackout rates are actually being reduced.
Speaking about the October 8th UK incident, Roger Hollies from the ARENCO Group, who originally posted about the outage response on linkedin (HERE) commented: ‘It’s exciting to see batteries casually keeping the lights on whilst delivering diversity of activity to maximise revenue. I count 9 markets and services being participated in by these 12 batteries during this 50 min window alone! This complexity is only going to continue with Quick Reserve coming online later this year, local markets expanding, more renewables coming online and we STILL are not using the +/-3Gvar of reactive power the installed BESS fleet can supply!’
In California, the number of blackouts has been dramatically reduced over the last couple of years. ‘Batteries were the biggest reason California didn’t see the power go out’ says Benjamin Storrow (see HERE). There has been a very big increase in battery installation in California. This has been driven partly by a State-led investment programme. In addition, the increase in battery capacity follows on from the new opportunities in spreading production from the increasing quantity of solar panels over longer periods of the day.
You can see the daily reports from California (see HERE) which illustrate how even the battery roll-out that’s been done already (lots, lots more to come) has already made a big difference. They are taking out a big chunk of the so-called duck-curve of solar generation and reserving it for evening power consumption.
Texas has been saved from a summer power blow-out by a combination of solar pv and batteries. Climate-change inspired hotter summers have put a strain on the Texas grid to cope with the rising demands for air conditioning to meet the summer heat spikes. Once again, solar pv and batteries have come to the state’s rescue. See HERE.
Of course a lot of work still needs to be adapt the electricity from its traditional centralised dispatch mode to a decentralised way of operation. These include incentivising longer duration batteries, something encouraged by a ‘cap and floor’ incentive system for batteries announced by the Government today. See HERE. Initiatives to replace the inertial load system provided by traditional centralised power plant with new inertial sources needed to support variable renewable energy are also in play, for instance promoted by Statkraft’s Guy Nicolson HERE. And, of course, weak power distribution systems often cause blackouts. This is especially in rural areas where overhead power lines are brought down by natural factors such as storms. But microgrids boosted by renewables could help there too!
Acknowledgement to Dave Andrews from the Claverton Group for the alert on the Norway link tripping event.
Have batteries saved the day in the UK at any other time than October 8, 2024? Are they not just one source of instant power such as pumped hydro that are used to manage spikes?
Will be interesting to see how the regulatory changes this year in TX will reshape the solar industry down there. We may finally see some grid scale battery solutions emerge as grid reliability / resilience is emphasized over grid following solutions like solar / wind.
A lot has been made of grid inertia, be it via nuclear, gas turbines, pump storage, or even flywheels. Bottom line, a resilient grid should allow for imports from adjacent ISOs while being able to produce enough locally to usually satisfy demand. Otherwise, blackouts like the one across Iberia will become more common.