Australian Renewable Energy Agency Invites EOI For Grid-Connected Community Batteries

Australian Renewable Energy Agency Invites EOI For Grid-Connected Community Batteries

Last year, Australia’s government made an announcement about the $200 million in grant funding for the Community Batteries for Household Solar Program. The initiative is aimed at delivering community batteries to lower electricity bills and emissions while also aiding storage of excess solar energy, and curbing grid pressure.

Now, a new round of grant funding has been started as part of the scheme. It promises $120 million to support over 300 grid-connected BESS projects of up to 5 MW each.

Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) is leading the funding round with the goal to give an impetus to rooftop solar, increase the employment of solar that is more affordable and take the pressure off grids. This will also curb electrcity bills and of course, emissions.

ARENA was handed out $171 million of the Albanese government’s Community Batteries kitty for the delivery of at least 342 of the shared solar batteries. ARENA has now issued an EOI (Expression of Interest) for grid-connected community batteries.

Eligibility 

As per ARENA, the first funding round will kick off with $120 million for grants, which will be between $2 million and $20 million. These will be projects proposing a minimum of five batteries. The second funding round will see the remnant $51 million being allocated to projects that have longer development times.

The eligibility criteria is that each proposed battery project will have to be connected to the distribution network, in either behind-the-meter or front-the-meter configuration. It must be between 50kW and 5MW (5,000kW).

The EOI period concludes on June 30. The complete application process will start in September and end in March 2024.

The Boon of Community Batteries

As various countries, including Australia increase their share of solar, initiatives such as shared batteries are the need of the hour. Batteries that are shared can be put up on parts of the grid with high rooftop solar uptake. This helps abosorb excess generation which in turn helps avoid wasted solar generation. At the same time, they help take excess pressure off the grid, and bringing down electricity bills as well as emissions.

Community batteries also establish a level playing field when it comes to access to rooftop solar.

As per ARENA CEO Darren Miller, calls community batteries “the next step” towards maximising distributed energy resources in Australia’s evolving electricity grid.

“Not everyone is able to install rooftop solar, but by storing electricity close to the point of consumer demand, we can reduce network costs and alleviate constraints in areas with high solar penetration. This will ultimately reduce electricity costs for all consumers,” ARENA CEO Darren Miller said.

The concept of community batteries is also at a nascent stage in India. In 2021, Tata Power-DLL in collaboration with Nexcharge, a joint venture between Exide India and Leclanché, launched India’s first grid-connected Community Energy Storage System (CESS) in Rani Bagh, New Delhi.