Alevo inks deal for 8-MW storage project in Delaware

Dive Brief:

Alevo Group is deploying an 8-MW, 4-MWh energy storage system in Lewes, Delaware, the largest of its kind in the state.
The project will use Alevo's GridBank technology and plans to sell ancillary services into the PJM Interconnection frequency regulation market while improving the reliabiiity of Lewes’s grid and shaving peak demand for end-users.
The project is the first deployment for Alevo's GridBanks technology, following the inauguration its manufacturing facility in Concord, North Carolina in late 2014.

Dive Insight:

Proximity to the PJM Interconnection is proving to be a boon to developers of energy storage projects in the region.

Since PJM, which operates the wholesale power market in the District of Columbia and all or part of 13 Mid-Atlantic states, opened its frequency regulation market to energy storage resources, developers have been finding that multiple income streams go a long way toward making a project economic.

The combination of load reduction and sales into the PJM market was key to a wayside storage project involving the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority, ABB, Constellation, Saft, and Viridity.

The latest entry is Alevo with an 8-MW storage project in Lewes, Delaware.

Alevo says the Lewes project is the first in a series of commercial deployments it has scheduled for 2016.

"Lewes BPW is a great partner for Alevo and we look forward to a long relationship with them and other municipalities," Alevo Vice President Jeff Gates said in a statement.

Alevo worked closely with the City of Lewes and the Lewes Board of Public Works (BPW) on the project, which will be housed in a retired generator building once operated by the BPW.

Lewes is at the "end of the extension cord" of PJM, Theodore W. Becker, mayor of Lewes, said. That gives the city few options to manage and improve capacity and transmission charges since retiring its generation capacity in 1999 due to tougher environmental rules.

The city also has a 1.5-MW wind farm at the University of Delaware and has one of the highest per capita installations of solar power in the nation.

"The Lewes Board of Public Works has high expectations for the Alevo batteries and operating system that will be dispatched through Customized Energy Solutions," Becker said in a statement.

As a precursor to the Lewes project, Alevo struck an operational agreement with Customized Energy Solutions to provide operations services via its Philadelphia market operations center for up to 200 MW of grid storage to the North American wholesale energy market.