Grid Storage News

OK, I'm going to start a thread for this because ...

Electric Power Monthly - December 2019 for October 2019.

Batteries

Capacity (MW):

Period	Prior	Change	New	Change
Month	1,003.0	3.3	1,006.3	0.33%
YTD	852.1	154.2	1,006.3	18.10%
Rolling	768.9	237.4	1,006.3	30.88%
Plan +12mo	93.5	50.0	140.2	.

Reported utility-scale battery capacity is creeping up and passed 1GW last month. 1GW deserves recognition.
An additional 50MW has been reported for the next 12 months, bringing the total to 140.2MW.

Obviously this ignores the retail or homebrew small-scale batteries that are being deployed.

For comparison of how small scale this is currently:

Hydroelectric Pumped Storage:

Capacity (MW):

Period	Prior	Change	New	Change
Month	22,909.2	0.0	22,909.2	0.00%
YTD	22,830.2	79.0	22,909.2	0.35%
Rolling	22,830.2	79.0	22,909.2	0.35%
Plan +12mo	191.6	0.0	191.6	.

Note that pumped storage also stores a lot more energy.

 

This is capacity, as reported in the Summer Capacity section of the EIA's Electric Power Monthly.

Since, unlike pumped storage, batteries are not (yet) reported in the generation statistics (whereas pumped hydro is reported as negative generation), the best we could probably do would be to back-calculate from the "Usage Factors for Utility Scale Storage".

For usage factors and capacity they only include whole-month values. It seems that the batteries that are deployed aren't being used as much.

Batteries:

Usage Factor (MW):

Value	Prior	Change	New	Change
Month Capacity	748.9	254.1	1,003.0	33.93%
Month Factor	5.0%	-1.6%	3.4%	-32.00%
Rolling 12mo Factor	5.5%	-1.1%	4.3%	-20.95%

Pumped Storage:

Usage Factor (MW):

Value	Prior	Change	New	Change
Month Capacity	22,830.2	79.0	22,909.2	0.35%
Month Factor	9.4%	-1.2%	8.2%	-12.77%
Rolling 12mo Factor	10.9%	-0.5%	10.4%	-4.43%

For Capacity Factors, the technical note says that it's:
sum(generation) / sum(capacity x time)
over generators and time periods.

For October 2019 batteries, assuming Usage Factor is the storage equivalent, and reported as negative generation as per Pumped Storage:

-1,003.0 MW x 31d x 24 h/d x 3.4%
= -25371.888MWh
= -25.4GWh

Pumped Storage was -373GWh in October 2019.

 

Electric Power Monthly - January 2020 for November 2019.

Batteries added a whopping 6.3MW of capacity.
Planned 12 month capacity increased 5.8MW to 139.7MW.

Capacity (MW):

Period	Prior	Change	New	Change
Month	1,006.3	6.3	1,012.6	0.63%
YTD	852.1	160.5	1,012.6	18.84%
Rolling	770.7	241.9	1,012.6	31.39%
Plan +12mo	140.2	5.8	139.7	.

Usage Factor (MW):

Value	Prior	Change	New	Change
Month Capacity	768.9	238.7	1,007.6	31.04%
Month Factor	5.3%	-1.6%	3.7%	-30.19%
Rolling 12mo Factor	5.3%	-1.2%	4.2%	-21.60%

 

Electric Power Monthly - March 2020 for January 2020.

Grid batteries added 8.1MW of capacity.
Planned 12 month additional capacity increased 149.8MW to 528.6MW.

Capacity (MW):

Period	Prior	Change	New	Change
Month	1,015.2	8.1	1,023.3	0.80%
YTD	1,015.2	8.1	1,023.3	0.80%
Rolling	873.6	149.7	1,023.3	17.14%
Plan +12mo	386.9	149.8	528.6	.

 

If you use 750,000MW generation as peak and assumed the pessimistic scenario that storage would have to provide all the power during the peak (which it wouldn't), and that batteries were 0.25C, then you'd need 3,000,000MWh (3TWh) of batteries to be able to meet all of that peak demand.

That might seem like a big number, but that's the equivalent of 60,000,000 50kWh batteries.

The USA has about 253 million light vehicles. So, if we can heavily electrify transportation, meeting peak demand with battery storage would be an easy task in comparison.