Australia’s energy and environment minister has hailed the
country’s accelerating residential energy storage sales as a report has emerged
from Chief Scientist Dr Alan Finkel which says the “financial equation is
straightforward” for adding batteries to home PV systems.
Finkel’s office produced reports during 2017 which advised
the government on the power market, opportunities and challenges for
renewables and decarbonisation and the role of clean energy technologies in
boosting the resiliency of energy networks across Australia. At the tail end of
the year, he also published a report on the “transformative role” of energy
storage.
Finkel had said that there should be better market designs
to incentivise peak shifting of solar and other forms of generation, which
could be done with battery energy storage in those reports. Nonetheless, in an
Occasional Paper on energy storage which he has just put his name to, the Chief
Scientist has said that it already makes financial sense for home PV system
owners to combine them with energy storage systems.
“The financial equation [to buy energy storage systems] is
straightforward, driven by the difference in the high price to purchase
electricity compared with the low price to sell it to the grid,” the paper
said.
Over 1.8 million Australian rooftops are fitted with solar
PV, most of which are residential. Feeding solar into the grid only makes the
seller around AU$0.08 per kWh, to give the ballpark figure quoted in Finkel’s
paper, while retail prices the same homeowner would pay for grid power are at
around AU$0.30 per kWh. Storing the electricity generated and self-consuming it
onsite instead therefore represents a significant potential for savings.
Minister for Energy and the Environment Josh Frydenberg
hailed the success of the market. Finkel found that around 21,000 home systems
were installed during 2017, which Frydenberg claimed made Australia a world
leader for installed capacity of batteries, when taken with large grid-scale
projects such as Tesla-Neoen’s 129MWh Hornsdale battery project in South
Australia and two others which Frydenberg’s government funded the installation
of.
“We are now not only the world leader in the use of rooftop
solar, but also the world leader in the installation of residential battery
storage by power capacity. As more renewable energy – mainly in the form of
solar and wind power – enters our electricity grid, the need for energy storage
solutions grows,” Frydenberg said.
“This is why the Turnbull Government put energy storage on
the agenda – to deliver a more affordable and reliable energy system for
Australians.”
The minister also hailed the arrival of virtual power plant
(VPP) projects, of which Australia is already hosting several, backed by
Frydenberg’s government.
Standardisation aims at installers as well as inspiring
consumer confidence
However, Germany is still thought to retain an overall
leading position by annual sales, with a report from research firm Delta-ee and
the European Association for Storage of Energy (EASE) on Europe’s energy
storage market finding that as many as 37,000 home systems were installed there
in 2017.
Both Germany and Australia are still clearly moving faster than nearly
every other market, with Europe’s next fastest-growing market, Italy, enjoying
around 8,000 unit sales in 2017.
Frydenberg also said that going forward, the controversial
National Energy Guarantee will ensure that utilities have to demonstrate they
have reliable energy capacity available, including battery storage where
applicable.
As the report emerged, it was also revealed groups including
the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) and
DNV GL will spur efforts for standardisation of system installation and other
best practises.
Expert advisory and certification body DNV GL said it has
been contracted to lead the creation of Australian Battery Performance
Standard, a proposed document aimed at making residential and commercial
consumers more comfortable with battery storage tech, informing their decisions
and hopefully boosting market confidence. Australian Council of Learned
Academies (ACOLA), which has worked with Finkel on his more recent reports,
said back in November 2017 that "consumer
confidence" is needed to capture the country's big opportunity to
use energy storage effectively and develop a sustainable industry.
DNV GL has put together a consortium that includes CSIRO,
well known for its PV research, Deakin University and trade group the Smart
Energy Council. The drive is being funded jointly by the national Australian
Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) and the state government of Victoria. A draft
is expected in the next two years.
Also in development is a guideline for standardised
installation, by national body Standards Australia. Early iterations of that
document were met with disdain for so-called
‘over-zealous’ safety rule proposals. The group later said it will
fast-track work on this - the next draft of that document will be out
this year, with a second round of public comments invited.
Energy-Storage.news heard from a senior sales representative
at Chinese lithium battery and EV company BYD recently that Australia is the
“second largest potential market” for residential batteries after Germany and
as such there is a desire for standardisation. Julia Chen, senior sales
director, said at Intersolar Europe / ees Europe that standards are most needed
on the “installation side as it’s a new technology for installers”.
On a related note, Energy Networks Australia (ENA), a trade
group representing transmission and distribution operators, said in June this
year that a more consistent
approach to grid connections of solar PV and battery storage is needed
and
published its own guidelines and recommendations for doing so.
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