Battery energy storage system claims world record

An energy storage system developed for the Golden Valley Electrical Association in Fairbanks, Alaska has been recognised officially by Guinness World Records as "the world's most powerful battery".

The US $30-million BESS (battery energy storage system) developed by Saft for the Golden Valley Electrical Association in Fairbanks, Alaska has been recognised officially by Guinness World Records as "the world's most powerful battery".

The BESS is designed to provide a guaranteed 27MW for a minimum of 15min to stabilise the local power grid and reduce its vulnerability to unexpected outages.

The new world record was set during the commissioning phase, in which the BESS was tested to its ultimate limits, when it delivered 46MW for 5min.

The previous (unofficial) world record holder was a 21MW BESS commissioned by PREPA (the Puerto Rico Power Authority) at Sabana Llana, Puerto Rico in 1994.

So GVEA's BESS is more than twice as powerful.

Saft won the contract to design and build the battery, which comprises 13,760 rechargeable nickel-cadmium cells in four parallel strings, as part of a BESS consortium led by ABB, the leading power and automation technology group, which provided the system concept and the DC to AC power convertor system.

Saft is providing a "cradle to grave" service by taking responsibility for the recycling of each cell.

Jim McDowall of Saft America, who co-ordinated the BESS project, said: "Official recognition of its world record status has set the seal on the BESS' 18-month availability guarantee period which ended in March 2005".

"GVEA required that it had to be available at full capacity for 98% of the time and we breezed through this with about a hundred hours to spare".

"Although the BESS is initially configured with four battery strings, it can readily be expanded to six strings to provide a full 40MW for 15min".

"The facility can ultimately accommodate up to eight battery strings, giving considerable flexibility to boost output or prolong the useful life of the system beyond the planned operation for 20 years".

Tim DeVries, BESS project manager for GVEA said: "Before the BESS we typically experienced 25 to 30 power supply outages a year and we anticipated that the BESS would achieve a 60% reduction in these events".

"In the first 18 months of operation it has exceeded our expectations by preventing around 85% of outages from affecting our customers".

"So far it has responded to some 60 outage events, saving well over 300,000 customer disconnections".

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