180 MWh of Lithium-ion Storage Plus 150-MW of Solar Contracted for California CCA
The “landmark amount of energy storage for the state of California” with CCA off-takers is a first for developer Recurrent Energy.
This week Recurrent Energy said it signed two 15-year power purchase agreements (PPAs) with Silicon Valley Clean Energy and Monterey Bay Community Power for a 150-MWac solar power system with 180 MWh of battery storage.
This is the largest solar plus storage in the state of California to date.
Power will be supplied from Recurrent Energy’s Slate project to be built in Kings County, California. The project is scheduled to reach commercial operation in 2021.
The lithium-ion battery component is 45 MW nameplate with 180 MWh of energy capacity, allowing for four hours of flexible energy delivery.
““With the integrated storage component, both CCAs will have the flexibility to fill the battery when wholesale energy prices are low and then discharge the energy when prices are higher to meet their unique load requirements in a cost-competitive manner,” said Dr. Shawn Qu, chairman and chief executive officer of Canadian Solar. (Recurrent Energy is wholly owned by Canadian Solar.)
This first-of-its-kind partnership resulted from a joint procurement process that Silicon Valley Clean Energy and Monterey Bay Community Power launched in September 2017 to source cost-effective, renewable power for their respective communities.
“We are excited to bring online the largest solar-plus-storage project by CCAs to date,” said Tom Habashi, CEO of Monterey Bay Community Power.
Canadian Solar’s Shawn Qu added that “Recurrent Energy was the first developer to close financing for a utility-scale solar project with CCA off-takers and we will leverage this expertise to ensure the project is successful.”