Second life battery storage provider Connected Energy has partnered with Argonaut Power to offer fully funded energy storage solutions to commercial and industrial (C&I) customers.
The E-STOR solution from Connected Energy, which utilises second life Renault electric vehicle (EV) batteries to provide cost effective stationary energy storage, will be offered to help customers reduce electricity costs and improve system resilience.
The systems will be funded and managed by Argonaut Power, backed by infrastructure investor Ingenious, which announced a similar partnership with Powerstar in July to offer battery storage solutions and on-site renewable generation.
Roberto Castiglioni, managing director of Argonaut Power, said: “Argonaut Power is delighted to begin working with Connected Energy using its E-STOR technology. This will enable us to supply fully funded, sustainable energy solutions for up to 30 years ahead.
“Heavy energy users in particular can hugely benefit from our product as not only [can] we offer energy storage but also onsite generation under long term fixed price to further reduce energy cost and carbon footprint.”
The first project to be carried out under the partnership will be for a water utility in the north of England, which will be used to reduce peak costs and network charges. The unnamed customer will also share in any revenues generated from any capacity market or frequency response contracts.
According to Matthew Lumsden, chief executive of Connected Energy, the pair have up to three projects “around about half a megawatt behind-the-meter installations” currently in development.
These are likely to develop slowly as potential clients must first be educated on the benefits of energy storage, as Lumsden explained to Current±.
“The whole origination process is quite slow because it’s based on quite a lot of education, but there’s a lot of potential customers out there. Very few people have bought storage before so they have to understand the technology and how you make money out of it.
“There’s quite a lot of learning and education processes to go through before you get as far as closing a sale,” he said.
However, he added that the potential benefits are greater than in the current front-of-the-meter market.
“You can capture more value streams so long as the site has the right energy profile. It’s challenging but there are sites you can make work and then you can provide additional benefits like resilience or peak shaving. It’s not easy but it’s an easier proposition to put together commercially,” he said.