POWER September 2023 - 10

GLOBAL MONITOR
3. VERBUND, an Austrian utility, has been
increasing its use of battery energy storage.
It is optimizing its use of the technology by
utilizing battery analytics software to better
understand the performance of its storage installations.
Courtesy: TWAICE
analytics software, which allows for
constant and easier surveillance of the
health of a BESS installation (Figure 3).
VERBUND's software is from Munich,
Germany-based TWAICE, among the
companies
involved with developing
this technology. The utility has said that
leveraging this application has resulted
in significantly reduced friction when
onboarding new storage, and enabled
higher availability during operation.
VERBUND's experience could be a
model for other utilities seeking to increase
their use of energy storage. VERBUND,
prior to starting its use of battery
analytics software, had commissioned its
BESSs through an onsite service provider.
The provider used measuring equipment
to evaluate the performance of the BESS,
a process that is expensive and timeconsuming.
With VERBUND significantly
scaling up its BESS assets in the upcoming
years, these issues and added costs
would likely become more complex and
prevalent, increasing the risk of failure to
meet future deployment deadlines.
Storage system installation also involves
cooperation with various manufacturers.
Every BESS has a different
user interface, and more significantly,
different integrators have unique processes
to calculate their metrics. This
makes it very difficult for utilities to get
comparable information about the different
systems at the beginning of life.
Battery analytics software provides
an on-demand comprehensive report
from just one online connection, with
no additional measurement equipment
needed, immediately at installation. The
thorough report offers an accurate read
on the BESS state of health and safety
by analyzing large amounts of data. The
VERBUND example shows how a digital
commissioning report provides a full audit
of a new BESS at the beginning of its
deployment, allowing for a utility to make
10
warranty or deficiency claims at the start
and set the baseline standard for future
asset management.
The battery analytics software uniquely
calculates the digital commissioning
report's findings through a standardized
process, so all diagnostics pulled from
each system are presented in the same
way, despite having various interfaces.
With each system speaking the same
language, VERBUND has found it can
verify the information provided by each
manufacturer and more easily compare
metrics. This comparability will be significantly
more important to evaluate
system performance and aging, as VERBUND
and other utilities increase the
number of varying BESSs in the field.
A key benefit of battery analytics software
is the ability to identify anomalies
consistently throughout the system's lifetime,
allowing for issues to be addressed
immediately, as they happen. The adoption
of this technology has given VERBUND
the ability to streamline the deployment
process for new systems and improve the
operation of existing systems.
Battery analytics
involves clustering
and analyzing huge amounts of data at
once, enabling the system to pinpoint
these anomalies and helping to identify
issues like weak cells, temperature
spikes, and cooling system deficiencies.
Because the conventional commissioning
process is done at the inverter level,
anomalies within strings or cells were
not identifiable to VERBUND before the
battery analytics audit. The company
now receives reports on its BESSs at
their deployment, and the software continuously
monitors the health and safety
of batteries to optimize operational efficiency
and revenue.
Battery analytics software can be a
true catalyst for growth in energy storage,
eliminating the need for costly onsite service
providers and measurement equipment,
while providing accurate state of
health metrics and diagnostics. This software
only becomes even more beneficial
when scaling up energy storage assets,
offering comparable metrics across many
differing interfaces and manufacturers.
VERBUND officials after successfully
onboarding the technology have reported
they can now more easily ramp
energy storage applications, helping the
company to efficiently and successfully
install its targeted 2 GWh of battery
storage capacity and 1 GW of energy by
2030 as part of Austria's clean energy
strategy. With the European Commission
reporting that the EU estimates
www.powermag.com
its share of renewable energy use will
reach nearly 70% by 2030, and 80% by
2050-up from 37% in 2021-system
flexibility will be important. That means
more battery energy storage will be
necessary, and so will be tools to support
BESS deployment.
-Lennart Hinrichs is vice president of
Marketing, Partnerships, and Industry
Strategy for TWAICE.
South Korea's First 'K-Gas
Turbine' Begins Commercial
Operation
Marking a significant inroad to establish
a South Korean foothold in the world's
gas turbine technology market, heavy industrial
company Doosan Enerbility this
summer began commercial operation of
its first domestically produced 270-MW
gas turbine and signed its first contract
for a large combined cycle gas turbine
power plant that will pioneer its 380-MW
H-class " ultra-large " gas turbine.
The company on June 28 announced
it signed a contract valued at $213 million
with utility Korea Midland Power Co.
(KOMIPO) for the 569-MW Boryeong
New Combined Cycle Power Plant, which
is slated to come online by June 2026
in Boryeong City, South Chungcheong
Province. The contract also involves supply
of a steam turbine and heat recovery
steam generators (HRSGs). On July 28,
meanwhile, Doosan began commercial
operation of a 270-MW class gas turbine
at the 500-MW Gimpo Combined
Heat and Power (CHP) plant in Gyeonggi
Province, which it developed with Korea
Western Power Co. (KOWEPO).
The developments are a triumph for
Doosan Enerbility, a company formerly
known until March 2022 as Doosan Heavy
Industries & Construction. Established in
1896, the company historically focused
its power generation capabilities on building
coal power plants, including much of
South Korea's giant coal-fired fleet. In the
1990s, however, Doosan kicked off development
of a gas turbine, and by 2005, it
proved that technical capability with the
in-house development of a 5-MW gas
turbine. Then, pivotally in 2013, Doosan
snagged weighty participation in a national
program initiated by the Ministry of Trade,
Industry, and Energy (MOTIE) and the
Korea Institute of Energy Technology to
curb the country's dependence on foreign
imports. South Korea's strategy sought
to develop a homegrown gas turbine industry
that could compete alongside the
U.S., Germany, Japan, and Italy, where the
world's biggest gas turbine original equipPOWER
| September 2023
http://www.powermag.com
POWER September 2023

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