Battery storage power station

A battery storage power station, or battery energy storage system (BESS), is a type of energy storage power station that uses a group of batteries to store electrical energy. Battery storage is the fastest responding dispatchable source of power on electric grids, and it is used to stabilise those grids, as battery storage can transition from standby to full power in under a second to deal with grid contingencies.^[1]

Battery storage power stations are generally designed to be able to output at their full rated power for several hours. Battery storage can be used for short-term peak power^[2] and ancillary services, such as providing operating reserve and frequency control to minimize the chance of power outages. They are often installed at, or close to, other active or disused power stations and may share the same grid connection to reduce costs. Since battery storage plants require no deliveries of fuel, are compact compared to generating stations and have no chimneys or large cooling systems, they can be rapidly installed and placed if necessary within urban areas, close to customer load.

As of 2021, the power and capacity of the largest individual battery storage power plants is an order of magnitude less than that of the largest pumped-storage power plants, the most common form of grid energy storage. For example, the Bath County Pumped Storage Station, the second largest in the world, can store 24GWh of electricity and dispatch 3GW while the first phase of Vistra Energy's Moss Landing Energy Storage Facility can store 1.2GWh and dispatch 300MW.^[3] However, grid batteries do not have to be large, a large number of smaller ones can be widely deployed across a grid for greater redundancy and large overall capacity.

As of 2019, battery power storage is typically cheaper than open cycle gas turbine power for use up to two hours, and there was around 365 GWh of battery storage deployed worldwide, growing rapidly.^[4] Levelized cost of storage (LCOS) has fallen rapidly, halving in two years to reach US$150 per MWh in 2020,^[5][6][7] and further reduced to US$117 by 2023.^[8] Additionally, annualized capital costs varies by which battery chemistry used for storage, but annualized capital costs of $93/kWh could be realized with Lithium iron phosphate by 2020.^{[not verified in body]}