US renewables developer Ameresco has won a contract from Southern California Edison (SCE) to design and build three grid scale battery energy storage systems with a combined capacity of more than 537MW.
The projects will be constructed at existing substation parcels throughout SCE’s service territory in California.
Ameresco said that the systems will increase reliability of the grid with a targeted commercial operation date in August 2022.
The systems equate to 537.5MW with a four-hour duration, for a total of 2150 megawatt-hours.
They will be located at three distinct distribution-level substation parcels in the San Joaquin Valley, Rancho Cucamonga and nearby communities and the Long Beach area.
Ameresco will deliver the storage through a turnkey engineering, procurement, construction and maintenance contracting mechanism.
SCE president and chief executive Kevin Payne said: “SCE sees a growing role for battery storage as we transition to delivering 100% clean renewable energy to customers
“The battery storage systems we have contracted for with Ameresco will make the grid more resilient to the effects of extreme weather and will help us continue our progress toward the clean energy future, which is essential to combating climate change.”
Ameresco chief executive George Sakellaris said: “Innovative cleantech projects of this magnitude have the ability to provide transformative solutions to regions in need of reliable and resilient energy.
“At Ameresco, we are so pleased to be a part of a project that takes such a meaningful step in providing cleantech solutions to combat the disruptive effects of extreme weather events across the nation.”