Highview Power has reiterated that it plans to build 50MW/250MWh liquid air energy storage (LAES) plants – and that the first will be on the site of a decommissioned thermal power station in the north of England.
Highview commissioned its first large scale plant last year, a 5MW/15MWh plant in Bury, greater Manchester.
Then CEO, Gareth Brett, told The Energyst that it intended to build a 50MW plant and bid it into the Capacity Market – and that building large plants was actually much easier than the 5MW Bury development because parts are easier to come by.
“At 50MW scale, the refrigeration plant and turbo expander are at a size that suits all of the big machinery manufacturers,” said Brett.
He added that LAES technology, while not as quick as lithium-ion batteries, “can do anything pumped storage can do.”
Highview Power, now helmed by former Wärtsilä president of energy solutions, Javier Cavada Camino, told a London conference on Monday that the scheme would be “the largest battery project in Europe,” and that the firm plans to develop a portfolio of large-scale cryo storage projects in the UK.
“Long-duration, giga-scale energy storage is the necessary foundation to enable baseload renewable energy and will be key to a 100 per cent carbon free future,” said Cavada Camino.
The company claims its technology can be delivered at £110/MWh for a 10-hour, 200MW/2GWh system.
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