First installation of a vanadium battery in South East Queensland
Vanadium batteries provide certain advantages over lithium-ion batteries, such as longer serviceable life with very high charging and discharging cycles possible — some sites have recorded 20,000 cycles, compared to 5,000 to 10,000 cycles for lithium-ion systems.
Vanadium systems can also fully charge and discharge without damaging the battery and have negligible capacity degradation over time. They can last up to 20 years with the key technology component, vanadium, being 100% reusable.
Our customer
Energex is South East Queensland’s electricity distribution network operator, distributing electricity to homes and businesses. Energex builds, operates and maintain the distribution network in South East Queensland; from the New South Wales border north to Gympie and west to the base of the Great Dividing Range.
Energex is part of the Energy Queensland Group of companies.
Their objective
Energex went to market tender to design, install and maintain a vanadium redox flow battery system. This would be the first vanadium battery installed on the Energex network and was intended as a trial of the new technology to assess the suitability of the medium-duration storage system for wider deployment across their electricity distribution network.
The site for the battery trial was the Energex Berrinba Depot in Logan City, Queensland.
The solution
We were successfully appointed as principal contractor responsible for the design and installation of a 250kW/750kWh system including:
- installation of the vanadium redox flow battery including 2 x electrolyte tanks and a battery tank including pump, cell stack and heat exchanger
- 278kVA rated inverter
- the design, supply, installation and integration of Balance of Plant (BoP) equipment
- AC board
- battery system enclosure
- system control and communication architecture
- battery management systems
- inverter control system
- power meters
- grid protection relays
- MCCB status (incomer, battery and solar supply)
- connection to the Energex network controller
- compliance with all relevant Australian Standards.
The outcome
This project was a Queensland first and was delivered on time and to budget for Energex to commence their trial. Vanadium flow batteries use tanks to store an electrolyte (vanadium) which stores the energy in chemical form and is circulated through a cell stack to convert to electrical energy for charging and discharging.
The unique architecture of a flow battery enables the energy storage capacity of the battery to be expanded by adding additional tanks and vanadium liquid.
