Duke Energy constructs North Carolina's biggest battery project at Marine base

• Duke Energy has started business operation of the North Carolina's largest battery system, an 11-MW project in Onslow County.

The battery system will certainly operate in conjunction with an adjacent 13-MW solar facility located on a rented site within Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune, which has been generating carbon-free energy considering that 2015. The two sites can also be run independently.

" Battery storage is a vital resource for our transition to cleaner energy," stated Kendal Bowman, Duke Energy's North Carolina state president. "Combining the energy storage space system with our existing solar facility at Camp Lejeune helps enhance the integrity of our energy grid as well as makes better use of our existing solar generation."

Both projects are linked to a Duke Energy substation and will be utilized to offer Duke Energy Progress customers.

" With a boosted usage lease and critical partnership with Duke Energy Progress, Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune has actually had the ability to make an important investment in the search of energy safety inside the fence-line," claimed united state Navy Cmdr. Ross Campbell, director of public operate at MCB Camp Lejeune. "Integration of the solar plant with a battery energy storage space system, unthinkable a decade ago, offers the installment with a variety of opportunities to attain energy resilience goals. These systems belong to the recurring partnership with the Division of Defense and also its energy providers to make certain energy safety and security at federal facilities."

The battery's chemistry is lithium iron phosphate with the system rated at 11-MW/11-MWh, and its physical footprint has to do with 1 acre. Duke Energy partnered with Black & Veatch building entity OCI, which was the main specialist for engineering, purchase and building on the project.

Over the last few years, Duke Energy has actually been broadening battery storage space in North Carolina. In the city of Asheville, a 9-MW lithium-ion battery system is running alongside a Duke Energy substation in the Shiloh community. In Madison County in the town of Hot Springs, the company has a 4-MW lithium-ion battery system that is part of a microgrid in the town.

Duke Energy expects to have more than 1,600 MW of battery storage in service by 2029. Presently, the business's regulated utilities have concerning 90 MW of battery energy storage projects in operation in 3 states.