POWER August 2017 - 35

COMMERCIAL & INDUSTRIAL GENERATION AWARD
The site had received its electricity from
three Cat C15 diesel generator sets (gensets),
running 24 hours a day, seven days a week,
365 days a year, and using about 250,000
gallons of diesel fuel each year to power the
TPG facilities. Caterpillar executives knew
that to put sustainability-which the company
today considers a core value-into practice,
a new and certainly better generation
system was needed.
" We need an extremely reliable supply of
power to keep our facility running without
interruption, so the system had to seamlessly
blend solar and generator set power, " Darrin
Johnston, customer solutions manager for new
where employees can submit ideas to management
with suggestions to improve safety,
quality, efficiency, and cost. Over the years
we had multiple suggestions for reducing
cost and improving sustainability by using
renewables, " he said. " In recent years, reductions
in the cost of solar power made the project
more affordable and viable. "
Caterpillar in 2016 installed 528 kWp DC
(500 kWp AC) of photovoltaic (PV) solar
panels (Figure 1) and 500 kW of short-term
energy storage lithium-ion batteries and ultracapacitors
to supplement the power from
the gensets. The gensets are rated at 410 kW
at 60 Hz. As Cazzato noted, the solar poten " We
need an extremely reliable supply of
power to keep our facility running without
interruption, so the system had to seamlessly
blend solar and generator set power. "
-Darrin Johnston, customer solutions manager for new ventures in
Caterpillar's Global Power Solutions Division
ventures in Caterpillar's Global Power Solutions
division, told POWER. The power system
would not only need to work for the TPG,
it also would make business sense for it to be
a technology Caterpillar could tout as having
commercial applications for power generation
in other areas and for other industries.
So two Caterpillar divisions got together,
along with other partners, vendors, an Arizona
Caterpillar dealer, and several company
staff members to develop a strategy for powering
the TPG while also building a product
other companies could use as a source
of renewable energy. Enter the microgrid, a
smaller, scaled-down version of a centralized
power system, designed not only to generate
electricity but also to distribute it and regulate
its flow.
Microgrid Technology Takes Shape
" Caterpillar had explored hybrid power system
technologies and demonstrated these
technologies for several years, " Tony Cazzato,
TPG facility manager and a member of
Caterpillar's SM&T division, told POWER.
" In parallel, employees had suggested that
TPG ought to look at solar power for the facility
due to favorable weather conditions at
the site. We have almost 320 days of sun [annually]
in Green Valley! "
Cazzato said Caterpillar had adopted
sustainability as a core value in 2012. " We
also run a continuous improvement program
August 2017 | POWER
www.powermag.com
35
tial was obvious, with the site located in the
Arizona desert.
The desert landscape would present some
of its own challenges. " From a construction
perspective, the property is quite hilly so we
had to design a site and move some earth
around to create a good location for the solar
panels, " said Cazzato. " Fortunately, we are
pretty good at moving dirt at Caterpillar. "
The site uses tracking solar panels, which
follow the sun as it moves throughout the
day, along with a fixed array, covering about
POWER POINTS
Caterpillar says its microgrid projects can
include combinations of many elements,
including:
Thin-film solar modules, which can
capture more energy and work well in
high-temperature and high-humidity
areas.
Caterpillar bidirectional inverters and
microgrid master controllers, which
optimize battery and system performance
in combination with lithiumion
batteries and ultracapacitors.
Generator sets that can be powered
by natural gas, biogas, diesel fuel,
heavy fuel oil, or dual fuel.
two acres of the desert location. The Catbranded
solar panels were manufactured
through a joint venture between Caterpillar
and First Solar, a Tempe, Ariz.-based company
that develops, engineers, builds, finances,
and operates solar plants worldwide.
The panels were installed by Empire Cat, a
locally owned Caterpillar dealership.
" With our new solar array and energy storage
system, we now get approximately 45%
to 50% of our energy from renewables overall,
and we are often able to shut down our
diesel generator sets during daylight hours, "
said Cazzato. " The project was something we
wanted to do, but it took the right timing and
circumstances for the project to take flight. "
Rick Rathe, the general manager of new
ventures for Caterpillar's Electric Power
2. Several parts working together. Caterpillar's microgrid system has several elements,
including solar, gensets, controls, remote monitoring, and energy storage. Courtesy:
Caterpillar
http://www.powermag.com
POWER August 2017

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