Innergex brings online 9MW/9MWh initially standalone battery storage project in France

• Renewables developer Innergex has finished a battery energy storage system (BESS) project in France, using a BESS solution made by a subsidiary of utility Hydro-Québec.

Full commissioning has taken place of the 9MW/9MWh Tonnerre BESS at Joux-la-Ville, a tiny commune in the north-central French region of Bourgogne-Franche-Comté, Innergex, which is additionally headquartered in Quebec, Canada, said on Friday (22 July).

The battery system has been built near to 2 existing Innergex wind farms, Yonne, integrated in 2016 with 44MW gross generation capacity and 30.6 MW net capacity, as well as Yonne II, commissioned in 2021 with 6.9 MW gross and 4.8 MW net capacity.

The plant will add to neighborhood grid stability and assistance maintain network security of supply. Innergex was handed a 7-year capacity contract for the plant from France's grid driver RTE. When it isn't being contacted by RTE to provide system services, Innergex will certainly be able to make use of the asset to join other revenue-generating market possibilities.

It's the current in a wave of BESS projects being created and also built in France, a battery storage market which to date has been slower to develop compared to those in adjoining Germany or the UK.

As a matter of fact, Innergex's Tonnerre plant represents concerning 1% of the quantity of openly introduced battery storage anticipated to be deployed at grid-scale in France throughout 2022 and 2023, according to figures given in March to Energy-Storage. news by energy storage consultancy team Clean Horizon.

Clean Horizon tallied with each other project announcements and also discovered about 900MW of projects this applied to. Analyst Corentin Baschet from the company claimed in an interview that this fast progress was impressive given that-- unlike the UK where battery operators can access a number of different revenue streams-- batteries in France can essentially access only two.

One of those is lasting acquired revenues for capacity market participation and also the various other is the European frequency control reserve (FCR) aka primary control reserve (PCR) secondary solutions market. Nevertheless, a third revenue stream, secondary reserve, or automated frequency remediation reserve (aFRR) remains in the procedure of being opened up.

aFFR's intro had been set up to already happen in France late last year, but the continuous crisis over rising electrical power rates in the country led regulatory authorities to place a pause on it. It is expected in the coming months in France and also its intro is being surprised throughout the various European markets by 2025 in coordination with each area's regulators, grid operators and also various other major stakeholders.

While there have been solar-plus-storage sites constructed in France's island areas with tenders over the past couple of years, the most significant battery storage site in landmass France so far is a 61MW/61MWh project in Dunkirk, northern France, created by TotalEnergies and also provided by battery storage company Saft, which TotalEnergies owns.

At the Tonnerre site just commissioned, Innergex contracted EVLO to supply the BESS solution utilized. Utility Hydro-Québec, which has the provincial federal government of Quebec as its primary investor, introduced EVLO in late 2020 to capitalise on chances in the expanding energy storage market.

EVLO Energy Storage, to give its full name, designs as well as makes battery systems based upon lithium iron phosphate (LFP) cells. Before launch to the larger market, the systems were checked in operation on Hydro-Québec's own grid network, carrying out a range of applications.

The Tonerre project was partially announced to be the subsidiary's initial project, and also its anticipated commissioning date had been for late 2021, which shows up to have been pushed back.

In December last year EVLO launched EVLO1000, a modular, containerised BESS unit with 1MWh capacity furnished with battery monitoring system (BMS) technology created by Silicon Valley business Nuvation.

Innergex noted that EVLO's BESS enclosure at Tonnerre is IEC 62933 certified and also UL 9540A evaluated, while the system's energy monitoring system (EMS) created internal at EVLO made it efficient in fulfilling RTE's stringent requirements for frequency reserve providers.

Founded in 1990, the programmer to date has put 3,484 MW net capacity of renewable resource assets right into operation, many hydroelectric and also wind, with some solar sites in Canada, France, Chile as well as the United States. The Tonnerre project notes its first-ever standalone battery energy storage project.