ViZn Energy Systems, Inc., a provider of energy storage systems for utility, C&I, and microgrid applications, has been awarded a 1MWh utility energy storage contract to ensure electrical grid stability in India. ViZn’s systems will be installed and integrated by Raychem RPG at Power Grid Corporation of India Limited (PGCIL) facilities in Puducherry, India.
The country of India is projected by Mercom Capital Group to install over 9 GW of new solar capacity in 2017, which will make it one of the largest solar markets in the world along with China, the United States, and Japan. India is already the fourth largest wind market in the world (behind China, the United States, and Germany) according to the Global Wind Energy Council with over 25 GW of installed wind power generation capacity. PGCIL is an Indian Public Limited Company that has the mandate for planning, coordination, supervision and control over the inter-state transmission systems and the national and regional power grids. The company plans to utilize energy storage to play a crucial role in ensuring stability of the grid and providing balancing mechanisms.
“India is an exciting, yet virtually untapped, market for energy storage due to the rapid growth of renewable energy and utility infrastructure challenges. For example, there are wind farms & solar farms that are curtailed over 30 percent annually. The Indian grid is adding significant amounts of renewable generation – which are inherently variable and intermittent by nature – so to ensure stability of the grid, balancing mechanisms in the form of battery energy storage systems will play a crucial role. Energy storage can resolve T&D issues, better integrate clean energy, offer businesses reliable and resilient power, and cost effectively enable microgrids for the 20 percent of the population that does not have grid access,” said Ron Van Dell, President and CEO of ViZn Energy Systems. “Raychem is a highly respected energy and infrastructure company and we look forward to working with them on our initial entry to the Indian market.”
Raychem RPG has been in business for almost 30 years as a leading enabler of energy technology solutions that improve the performance, reliability, and economy of the electrical grid. “ViZn’s zinc-iron flow batteries are a great value given their excellent total cost of ownership over 20 years,” said Nitin Sharma, Head – Solar & EMS of Raychem. “We selected ViZn because their system will provide maximum power and cycles for 20 years with no degradation. Grid stabilization is a high stress application and ViZn is quite unique in their ability to execute without HVAC equipment in a harsh tropical climate that often exceeds 120°F in the summer.”
The ViZn flow batteries are housed in shipping containers that do not require cooling systems and are easily interconnected to meet a project’s power and energy requirements. ViZn Energy’s flow batteries experience zero capacity fade over 20 years and they have full access to 100% of their state of charge, giving them significantly more useable output than competitive batteries. Uniquely, they are also capable of performing both rapid, high-power discharges and slower, long-duration releases at lower power (unlike other storage technologies that can only do one or the other). This enables utilities, C&I customers, and other end users to stack applications and incorporate multiple value streams. The inherently safe zinc-iron chemistry uses globally abundant materials and is non-flammable, non-toxic and easily recyclable at the end of life.
