FuturEnergy Ireland has submitted a planning application for its first battery storage project, Ballynahone Energy Storage, to Donegal County Council.
The proposed scheme, the first of its kind in Europe, is designed to use iron-air battery technology capable discharging energy at its full power output for up to 100 hours when fully charged.
This first small 10MW project will be capable of storing 1 gigawatt hour (GWh) of energy, which is more than half the energy capacity of Turlough Hill, while future projects in development will be capable of storing up to 8GWh.
The principle of operation is reversible rusting: while the battery is discharging, it breathes in oxygen from the air and converts iron metal to rust; while the battery is charging, the application of an electrical current converts the rust back to iron and the system “breathes out” oxygen.
This breakthrough technology has the potential to absorb enormous amounts of surplus Irish renewable energy during times of high output and provide the renewable power back into the grid system when it is needed most, for example, during extended periods of extreme weather, grid outages or low generation.
The battery will also simultaneously relieve grid congestion issues faced by wind and solar projects, reducing the need for new overhead power lines.
FuturEnergy Ireland portfolio director Paul Blount: “Ireland’s power sector decarbonisation targets are among the most ambitious of any country globally.
“If we are to realise these ambitions, it is not enough to simply keep building more wind and solar projects.
“We need new technologies with the ability to time-shift very large energy volumes at low cost if we are to fully decarbonise our power system in a manner that is affordable for consumers.
“Iron-air technology was selected by FuturEnergy Ireland following a robust procurement process.
“Based on analysis completed by our team, we believe this technology has the potential to be a gamechanger for the Irish power system.”
Form Energy is the US company behind the iron-air technology.