Energy Storage

The energy storage opportunity for Commercial & Industrial electricity users

Cost effective energy storage has finally arrived, bringing high electricity users the opportunity to:

• store electricity from solar panels: if you have a solar system, store excess solar for later use rather than export it to the grid;
• reduce peak electricity costs by reducing time of use charges such as TRIADs and DUoS;
• earn income by providing support services such as firm frequency regulation and capacity market payments to the National Grid*;
• install a reliable emergency power supply or back-up (replacing environmentally unfriendly diesel generators);
• avoid the need for costly grid upgrades g. to support EV charger roll-out.
• reduce carbon footprint by reducing transmission losses (when used with on site generation) and making the grid greener by eliminating the need for further investment in fossil fuel generation.

The typical payback time for a commercial battery storage system is around 5 years, with IRR% over 15 years running at 5% - 30%.

Self-fund or Storage as a service?

We work closely with financiers and are able to offer funded energy storage solutions, either using a standard vanilla lease structure, or by offering energy storage as a service, such that we retain ownership of the battery and you pay only for the benefits that you utilise.  The risks and rewards of owning the system can therefore be shared as required by you.

Why Spirit?

• We are integrated solution providers, with the ability to design, install and maintain a complete solution including low voltage switchgear, converters, batteries and battery management system. Via our partners, we can also provide any high voltage work required. We can integrate with solar, wind, and EV chargers as required.
• We work with energy storage manufacturers, aggregators and other providers (e.g. EV charger manufacturers) to optimise the solution that we provide, whether on-grid or off-grid.
• We are not tied to any one technology or manufacturer. We work with a whole range of technologies (for example lithium ion, lithium ferro phosphate, zinc hybrid, copper zinc), and a range of manufacturers, including ABB, Sungrow, Samsung, NPS-Aurora and Simpli-Phi.
• We offer funded energy storage solutions, with access to a range of financiers and financial instruments to suit different balance sheet and regulatory requirements.
• We are techies, paying attention to the detail. And we are passionate about the technology. Our vision for the future is for every building to have on-site power generation and storage, creating a grid of interconnected ‘micro’ power plants. Our mission is to make that future happen faster.

*The Grid Under Pressure: With around 30 GigaWatts of older fossil fuel and nuclear generation due to be de-commissioned by 2025, the UK is marching towards an energy capacity ‘gap’. The ‘capacity margin’, the buffer between peak demand and supply, has tightened, and the National Grid is being forced to take measures to secure additional capacity. Historically coal has accounted for a large proportion of current UK balancing services, but coal will be fully decommissioned by 2025, which will make the problem of balancing demand and supply in the grid more challenging, particularly as intermittent solar and wind generation becomes more prevalent. The Grid is therefore paying for grid balancing services and spare capacity; fast response batteries are ideally placed to provide these services, usually via an aggregator.