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Isa Cteep inaugurates first large-scale battery system

Project is installed at a substation in Registro, São Paulo, operated by the company

11/29/2022

Rui Chammas — Foto: Silvia Zamboni/Valor

Rui Chammas — Foto: Silvia Zamboni/Valor

Isa Cteep has put into operation the first large-scale battery power storage system in the Brazilian transmission system. The battery project is installed at a substation in Registro, São Paulo, also operated by the company.

The battery systems have 30 megawatts of power and are capable of delivering 60 megawatt-hours of energy for two hours to a region of up to 2 million people. The goal is for them to act during peak consumption periods on the Southern Coast of São Paulo during the summer, especially in the year-end holidays, ensuring additional supply.

In all, there are 10 containers with 180 racks of lithium batteries, which were imported from China, and occupy an area of nearly 5,000 square meters, equivalent to half of a soccer field. The executive director of projects, Dayron Urrego, and the company’s chief executive, Rui Chammas, said that the technology is expected to avoid interruptions in the power supply during load periods.

The system is planned to go into operation the moment Brazil’s national grid operator ONS gives the order. The company estimates that they will probably be used on average 12 times a year. The criterion for choosing the region was that studies pointed out that the southern coast of São Paulo has a power deficiency and should be supplied by a transmission line from the 2017 auction, which is not yet ready.

“During the summer, it is common to have a higher demand than the system can supply, so the batteries come in to supply the peaks of this demand, but they can also have other uses,” said Mr. Urrego. “The biggest peak is in the summer because of the use of air-conditioning, besides moments like Christmas and New Year’s Eve.”

Storage systems are considered the next technological frontier in the energy transition, because they play the role of guarantee of supply since they have characteristics – such as inertia, frequency, and voltage controllers – necessary for the operation of the system with due security and resilience.

In addition, the insertion of intermittent renewable generation, such as solar and wind, which cannot be stored in their original forms, has generated a series of operational complexities for the electric system.

This instability creates a challenge for the ONS, which orchestrates the mix of all sources to meet real-time demand, which also varies. Batteries are important because their command is in human hands and does not depend on the sun, wind, and rain.

“Energy transition brings opportunities and responsibility to make intermittent renewable energy be absorbed in the best possible way. We who invested in the first digital stations for better control of the equipment now get into batteries and think about using this technology and flow control,” said Mr. Chammas.

The amount invested approved by the Brazilian Electricity Regulatory Agency (Aneel) was R$146 million and is part of a total disbursement for reinforcement and improvement, which in the third quarter of this year reached R$471 million.

As a result, the Colombian company will have allowed annual revenues (RAP) of R$27 million. Mr. Chammas said that the regulator’s determination was that they should be put in place before the beginning of the summer – which in Brazil starts on December 21 – so that they would be entitled to the investment.

“Aneel authorized us to do the project. In one year, we did the engineering project, acquired the batteries from China, prepared the land, installed the construction, and energized it,” he said.

Because it is a disruptive technology, this topic still has no regulation at Aneel. Mr. Chammas considers it fortunate that the process fell under the rapporteurship of the agency’s director Sandoval Feitosa, who advocated the project’s approval.

The next reserve power auction is expected to be neutral regarding the technology to be adopted. Until now, these auctions were oriented toward gas-fired thermal generation. “If this is confirmed, we will have a great opportunity,” the CEO said.

*By Robson Rodrigues — São Paulo

Source: Valor International

https://valorinternational.globo.com/
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ISA Cteep to build Brazil’s first large energy storage project

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ISA Cteep, a private-sector power transmission company, agreed to build the first large-scale energy storage project linked to Brazil’s National Interconnected System (SIN). The company signed a contract with a consortium that includes You.On Energia, a company specialized in energy storage systems, and TS Infraestrutura, which gathers engineering assets spun off from Toshiba.

The companies have not revealed the value of the agreement. The 30-megawatt project was approved by the electric sector regulator Aneel last year to expand the power grid in the coastal cities of São Paulo, Brazil’s most populous state. The R$146 million project is expected to start operating by the end of the year in Registro.

The location was chosen due to the high demand for electric power during the summer when tourists flock to coastal towns, said Rui Chammas, CEO of ISA Cteep. “In this region, we typically put in place special operations to ensure the quality of supply. We realized that it would be important to find a way to meet peak demand,” the executive said.

Aneel allowed ISA Cteep to have yearly revenue of R$27 million with the project. Batteries are being imported from China by You.On Energia.

China has the largest companies in terms of scale production of lithium-ion batteries, which means good quality and price, said Giorgio Seigne, CEO of You.On Energia. “There are American and European providers, but they are not competitive in terms of prices and delivery times. We hope that the local industry can provide batteries of the necessary size for a large-scale project in the coming years,” he said.

The batteries are being manufactured and are expected to arrive here by August. The earthmoving works are expected to end by April, and the companies expect to start laying cables by May. Companies have already contracted all the equipment, said Helder Torres, the chief commercial officer of TS Infraestrutura. “We are talking about a very fast deployment project, in a pandemic and war scenario, so we have to be very efficient,” Mr. Torres said.

TS Infraestrutura will make the project’s protection and control panels in its factory in Curitiba, Paraná. “We will be responsible for integrating and controlling the batteries to take information to the substation. This is the first integration in Brazil of a protection and control system between the substation and the storage system,” Mr. Torres said.

The executives believe that new storage projects will emerge in the country from this first effort. According to them, the growth of renewable power sources, with the energy transition, will require such solutions. This happens because renewable sources like solar and wind depend on weather conditions to generate energy, so batteries are a way to store the power generated to be released when the weather is unfavorable.

“One way to expand the share of renewable sources in Brazil’s power generation mix is by giving them greater predictability. A non-dispatchable, non-predictable renewable source, when combined with a storage system, becomes dispatchable, that is, more widely used by the national system operator. So there is a quality improvement in what is delivered by a renewable source,” Mr. Seigne, with You.On, said.

Energy storage can also be a less polluting solution for supplying electricity in systems not connected to the Brazilian grid, he said. Such systems, located mainly in the North region, are mostly supplied by diesel generators, which are more expensive and polluting.

ISA Cteep may seek opportunities to develop new battery projects, the company’s chief executive said. “This first work will be a barometer for future projects, because it will bring knowledge and experience. With the growth of renewable energies, we will need solutions that ensure reliability, regularity and quality in the power supplied. This undoubtedly includes the capacity of the system to store energy,” Mr. Chammas said.

Source: Valor International

https://valorinternational.globo.com

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