Background
One of the largest electric utilities in the United States, delivering electricity to more than 5 million customers across 11 states engaged EPE to perform a system impact study for a proposed 9.9MW BESS intended to connect to their Substation in TX. The project involved connecting the BESS to their grid through a new dedicated feeder breaker at the substation. The study was commissioned to assess the potential impacts of the new system o the existing infrastructure, ensuring that integration would be both reliable and efficient.
Challenge
A significant challenge for this project was that another BESS project was already in queue ahead of ours. As a result, specific operating scenarios had to be developed to evaluate the potential impacts of both energy storage projects operating in parallel. This required a careful and detailed analysis to ensure that the combined effect of both systems on their infrastructure could be accurately assessed, identifying any potential issues or conflicts in their simultaneous operation.
Approach
To address these challenges of analyzing both BESS projects operating in parallel, EPE collaborated closely with client’s planners to develop specific operating scenarios. These scenarios were designed to evaluate the impacts of both BESS projects under peak and minimum loading conditions.
Solution
Due to the inherent variability of BESS output, acting as both a generator and a load, the analysis for this project became significantly more complex, with the required effort increasing fourfold. Through detailed analysis, EPE identified several violations and mitigations, primarily stemming from thermal requirements during the charging phase of the BESS projects and the potential for rapid voltage changes caused by power fluctuations. EPE provided targeted mitigation recommendation to address these issues, ensuring that both BESS projects could be safely integrated into client’s system. These recommendations were crucial to the client to approve the interconnection of these two BESS projects.
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