Norm Campbell, Federal Team Manager at Go Electric, explains how modular microgrids and standardization can lower the cost of microgrids.
Norm Campbell, national team manager at Go Electric
As a manufacturer of battery-operated microgrid systems, we keep hearing from end customers that microgrid systems are too expensive to install and that they don’t pay for themselves enough. These would be systems that are behind the meter and not for the generation, storage and control of renewable energies on a supply scale. This problem was in the foreground of the slowly increasing acceptance of microgrid systems. Solving this challenge will greatly improve the ability of end users to scale up microgrid installations to improve the resilience of their facility or campus.
There are several ways to reduce the cost in a microgrid and the current focus is on reducing battery costs. For a battery energy storage system (BESS) that accounts for more than 50% of the control system costs (generation excluded in this calculation), it makes sense to look at the large cost boxes. Battery prices are falling due to changes in manufacturing and purchasing volume, but with current chemistry and processes, these prices are bottoming out. When this will happen is a big talk within the industry with numerous publicly available articles and studies.
However, there are hidden soft costs within microgrid systems that can be nearly eliminated. These soft costs focus on custom engineering and system installation. A great analogy can be seen in the field of nuclear power generation, where Europe was standardized to specific reactor specifications for design and implementation and the US allowed many variations of the design. The result has been stable costs for building nuclear power plants in the EU and a wide range of costs for building systems in the US. There is currently no standard design in the microgrid industry. Each project is viewed as a unique or custom system. This approach adds cost and complexity to engineering and construction where it may not be needed.
Source: Go Electric
So what’s a solution? A modular and scalable battery-operated microgrid system that can operate in a distributed manner appears to solve several of these problems. Thanks to the standardization and the construction on a unit, a microgrid can be set up, tested and used with minimal special technology and installation – a system as shown in Figure 1. In this case, microgrid systems with microgrid controllers, BESS and switchgear can be built in a single ISO standard arrangement. These systems can be designed for basic use cases and additives when the customer needs more resilience. The engineering is carried out at the production site and the integration engineering is site and connection-specific. Installation is reduced to pouring a concrete slab or pylons, leveling the system, connecting decentralized energy resources, connecting to the load center and commissioning the microgrid control in the field. Compared to the conventional installation of microgrid systems, both the engineering and the installation effort and the resulting costs are directly reduced.
An additional benefit of such a design is that it creates a potentially distributed microgrid system that can be installed at times convenient for the customer with less capital outlay for critical loads. As the critical load requirements of the facility or campus change, other distributed microgrid packages can be installed and interconnected to operate in accordance with customer requirements. Similar to how Burger King once used the slogan “Have it your way”. Just like with hamburgers, these modular systems do the same for microgrids with lower installation costs. Current experience and installations show a 20 percent reduction in soft cost installations, and as systems move into mass production, these cost reductions are expected to only increase.
In conclusion, it is time to move away from custom microgrid solutions for the 80% of applications that don’t require custom engineering and provide systems that are easy to install and operate. The platform battery-enabled microgrid is an excellent way to make microgrids more cost effective and to implement them, especially where it is needed most.
Norm Campbell is the national team manager at Go Electric.
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