Swedish solar park gets battery back up

The 2MW/2MWh battery is said to make the solar park, which has 30,000 solar panels, the largest co-located solar-plus-storage plant in Sweden.

Battery storage at the site will be operational in December 2022.

Alight developed, owns and manages the solar park whilse Tekniska verken is part owner of the solar park and the battery, as well as grid owner and land owner.

“We are very proud to establish the largest solar-plus-storage plant in Sweden to show how subsidy-free solar and storage is unlocking major opportunities,” said Harald Överholm, CEO of Alight. “By adding storage solutions to our solar parks, we revolutionise the way we produce renewable electricity, making it a force of predictability and grid stability. As solar-plus-storage increasingly becomes a standard, everybody wins.”

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With renewables becoming a larger part of Sweden’s energy mix, it has become increasingly difficult to maintain balance in the nation’s power grid due to intermittency. According to Alight, energy storage systems including batteries are a source of flexibility that can contribute to grid balancing and become a key enabler of GW-scale deployment of renewable energy in the grid.

The battery will contribute to balancing the national electricity grid through frequency regulation, ancillary services, and optimisation of solar energy production when needed by the grid owners and operators.

“Tekniska Verken's vision is to build the world's most resource-efficient region,” said Fredrik Remneblad, Tekniska Verken's business unit manager for solar, wind and hydropower. “This requires innovative technological solutions to replace fossil fuels. It is therefore gratifying that we can take another step in the right direction by working with Alight to bring new innovation in the form of energy storage to a utility-scale solar park.”

Remneblad continued: “The aim is to contribute to much-needed regulation in Svenska Kraftnät’s frequency and balance markets in order to further stabilise today's electricity system, while we believe it can be a good deal for us.”