India sets the ball rolling for large-scale Battery Energy Storage System

The Centre has given a go ahead to inviting expression of interest for the installation of 1,000 MWh Battery Energy Storage System (BESS) as a pilot project.

This is a joint effort of the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy and the Ministry of Power, which have been working on this to provide a roadmap for the installation of the energy storage system in the country.

In order to support the ambitious goal of achieving the 450 GW renewable energy target by 2030, it is important that it gets duly supported by the installation of energy storage systems (battery energy storage system, hydro pump storage plants etc.).

Prohibitive cost of such systems had prevented its large-scale deployment earlier.

The Solar Energy Corporation of India (SECI), a CPSU under the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy, has called for the expression of interest for the procurement of 1,000 MWh BESS. This will be published along with the RFS bid document and the draft comprehensive guideline for the procurement and utilisation of BESS as a part of generation, transmission and distribution assets and with all ancillary services.

This will also be discussed in the pre-bid conference scheduled on October 28. Based on the suggestions and feedback from the various stakeholders, the final RFS document will be floated in the first week of November.

Going forward, India plans to use energy storage systems under the following business cases: Renewable energy along with energy storage system; Energy storage system as grid element to maximise the use of transmission system and strengthen grid stability, and also to save investment in the augmentation of transmission infrastructure; storage as an asset for balancing services and flexible operation.

The system operator, i.e., load dispatchers (RLDCs and SLDCs), may use the storage system for frequency control and balancing services to manage the inherent uncertainty/variations in the load due to non-generation.

Storage for distribution system may be placed at the load centre to manage its peak load and other obligations.