Economic Viability of Battery Energy Storage System Applications

Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS) can provide a number of applications to the grid operators, utilities and consumers, with different financial potentials. In this paper, services and application cases with high economic potential are presented and analyzed. This analysis is aiming to inform the interested parties about the viability of energy storage applications and to provide guidelines for further development. The economic viability of different energy storage applications was performed via the use of techno-econometric models. The results show a positive Net Present Value (NPV) for the applications of Excess PV Energy Utilization (EPVU) and Maximum Demand Charge (MDC) reduction. A highly positive NPV emerged from the combination of the two applications for cases where the MDC is applicable. For frequency regulation applications, high NPV arises for systems with power to energy ratios from 1 MW / 0.75 MWh to 1 MW / 0.5 MWh, although the battery system end up with shorter lifetime as a result of to the high cycling requirements. Finally, for the Transmission and Distribution (T&D) upgrade deferral applications, the NPV is positive only for cases with significantly high upgrade costs.