Lord Rupert Redesdale has said that dynamic demand response and energy storage technologies represent a “huge opportunity” for energy managers in the near future.
Speaking at this week’s Clean Energy Summit, the Energy Managers Association chief executive said that on the back of expected significant cost reductions, behind the meter batteries installed within buildings and facilities would open up the potential for energy managers to benefit their business by shifting their demand to more profitable times.
This is against a backdrop of reducing demand and increasing generation capacity. The National Grid has already handed contracts to twelve companies which will see them paid to increase their demand this summer, and Redesdale said he only expected this situation to exacerbate.
Redesdale gave his belief that “panic mode is setting in” and that as a result, battery storage deployment would become more and more lucrative.
He added however that this wouldn’t be “top down” – which would involve battery storage being deployed at grid-level first and foremost – but the other way around.
The example Redesdale gave involved the possibility of a facility management firm with hundreds, if not thousands of properties which would all have battery storage installed. That could be aggregated and controlled from a central system which would determine and manage the best time to buy and use grid electricity over what has been stored.
The predictability of battery life cycles and profitability would also see the technology be of significant interest to financial institutions, Redesdale said.
“There is no such thing as a silver bullet, but this would be a fantastic way of increasing the value of your asset,” Redesdale added.
