Vattenfall plans to start construction of the 22 MW storage project in summer 2017, promising what is believed to be the largest co-located battery and wind farm project in the UK. It will provide a rapid-reaction grid reliability service, known as Enhanced Frequency Response, to National Grid and will consist of six shipping container units. These will be located on site at Vattenfall’s 228 MW Pen y Cymoedd Wind Energy Project, on land managed by Natural Resources Wales (NRW).
The company plans preliminary site investigations for the project (battery@pyc) in June or July this year. Once complete, construction on site could start as early as August and be completed by Christmas. Operations at the battery facility is scheduled to start in February 2018.
“Vattenfall will provide a really important service to the British consumer” said Frank Elsworth, Vattenfall’s Project Manager for battery@pyc. “Battery@pyc can respond to power fluctuations on the grid within a second – by pumping in power if frequency drops, or drawing in, if too high. These reliability services have been provided for decades, but not this smartly, so we think battery@pyc is the kind of affordable solution that will help power climate smarter living in the UK.”
Gunnar Groebler, Vattenfall’s Head of Business Area Wind added that the project is the company’s biggest battery project to date and will be part of a smart transition to a fossil-fuel free Britain and Europe. The company has ambitions for more batteries at its wind farm sites across Europe and expects that this will lead to more storage facilities in the UK.
The Pen y Cymoedd Wind Energy Project started operating at full power earlier this month. The 76-turbine wind farm can meet the electricity needs of more than 13 percent of households in Wales every year. It also boosts delivery of Wales’s climate change ambitions, displacing in an average year more than 300,000 tonnes of CO2 from fossil fuelled generation.
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