With the electrification of the society, our energy consumption has changed. When everyone wants to charge the battery in an electric car in ten minutes, it offers a great challenge for both energy producers and distributors.
For that reason, Bertel O. Steen Power Solutions works to provide solutions that help stabilize today's power grid and find solutions that secure the delivery of energy in an electrified society.
The electrification of various sectors for reducing emissions introduces new challenges when it comes to the electric power grids.
For example, charging stations for road transport causes large power demand variations in the electric grid, and you might get high power needs in areas that traditionally have not had a strong power grid. Expanding weak power transmission grid involves big expenses for distribution companies - Eirik Nesse, Director Marine Propulsion at BOS Power
Battery facility at Senja
BOS Power is now in the processes of handing over a new battery energy storage (BESS) facility at Senja to Arva Kraft, which will be used to fortify the distribution network to the small islands.
‘We have delivered Norway`s largest land-based battery, that can support these power fluctuations.’ The battery will provide stored energy when the power demand is high, and recharge when there is a lower power demand.
‘This is an example of a new type of solution that makes the energy grid more effective and evens out consumption througout the day. And there are many places like Senja where the power grid is not dimensioned for the electric power needs of the modern society and where will be expensive to expand these networks.’
A changed energy mix
In Sweden, Denmark and Finland, several new wind power facilities are being constructed, both on land and at sea.
‘The issue with a higher mix of energy from wind power is that when the wind blows everyone has energy to sell and the electricity price is low. But when the wind is low, nobody has energy to sell and consequently the price gets high. This introduces even new challenges to the energy sector’, said Nesse.
In the future, BOS Power intends to develop Hydrogen production facilities together with Rolls-Royce Power Systems. In these systems, the excess electric energy will be sent to an electrolysis system, which converts the energy to Hydrogen which can be stored and sold as an energy carrier (fuel) or converted back to electrical energy by fuel cells when the electricity demand is higher than the production from the wind park.
‘Hydrogen is a relatively expensive energy carrier to produce, but if wind facilities have zero income when the wind is calm, it's better to produce Hydrogen with the excess energy which can then provide an alternative revenue for the wind park operator.’
The energy mix in Scandinavia has changed from being dominated by traditional hydro power with a relatively stable and predictable consumption, to a range of different technologies and a mix of wind, water and solar as sources.’ In this picture of an increasing and varying demand for energy, due to the electrification of various applications, battery storage technologies come in to assist also for the energy suppliers.
"BOS Power is in the process developing this market and these energy solutions, and we think it's really exciting", said Nesse.
"At the same time, we continue to represent the traditional technologies for marine propulsion systems and emergency power solutions for critical infrastructure and industrial facilities as the Scandinavian distributor of mtu solutions from Rolls-Royce Power Systems.
New technologies offer more predictability
‘As more un-regulable renewable energy sources are being developed, price fluctuations of the electric energy are expected to be greater. We must be prepared for the energy costs to be higher in the future than historic prices we have seen in the Nordics. However, the new storage technologies will help reducing the fluctuations and make the Nordic power sector more predictable so that we won't see the extremely high or low prices we've seen in the last year’.
‘We first aim to develop battery storage systems both in the power distribution networks and at the renewable energy production facilities, and then Hydrogen and perhaps even synthetic fuel production in the future. We want to drive these new technologies forward in the Nordic energy sector.’
Great potential and rapid development
At Senja, they will now start the pilot phase in the live electric power grid.
‘Arva Kraft will now go through a one-year operating and trial period, learning how to use the battery energy storage system most efficiently.’
Energy pack for Arva Kraft
‘We believe this has great potential and can support the power grid in meeting a demanding and fluctuating energy need without the need for massive infrastructure investments. The development of new technologies happens pretty fast now’, concludes Nesse.