Decentralised power production needs decentralised storage

08 Sep Decentralised power production needs decentralised storage

Swiss Academy of Engineering Sciences (SATW)
September 2016

Authors: Theodor Borsche, Andreas Ulbig, Göran Andersson
Main themes: energy, storage
Nature of publication: study

Power production in Switzerland is changing. End customers, previously consumers of centrally produced power, are themselves becoming local power producers and storing power for their own needs. In addition to central production in large power stations, there is an increasing number of small power stations producing their own power, in particular using photovoltaic systems. Power generation from new renewable energy sources is not constant or easily predictable. This unusual situation causes problems for network operators. These can be easily technically remedied by furnishing decentralised power production with local storage, but decentralised storage can also be used by a network operator for other tasks: how economic this storage is depending on the tasks which it is able to undertake. SATW commissioned the Power Systems Laboratory at ETH Zürich to investigate how and for what decentralised storage systems could best be used.