Energy storage and what that means for high penetrations of wind power in the UK

There is a growing consensus that the future Net Zero UK will draw the bulk of its primary energy from wind power with the remainder being supplied mainly by solar power and some nuclear power. A report on Large Scale Energy Storage released recently by the Royal Society addresses how the inevitable differences between generation resource and natural electricity demand can be addressed. That report proposes a “baseline solution” using hydrogen stored in salt caverns and shows that this baseline solution is both viable and affordable. We can do better than the baseline solution and a software resource called [NStore_sim] (www.era.ac.uk/resources/NStore_sim) enables one to see how a combination of different energy storage options can further reduce costs whilst still satisfying all requirements. Compressed air energy storage (CAES) also using salt-cavern storage is seen to have a useful role. Even with both hydrogen and CAES facilities present, further cost reduction is possible through integrating energy storage directly with a fraction of the wind turbine fleet. This presentation will note that there are at least five classes of technology for such integration and will explain the common advantages of these.

Seamus Garvey is Professor of Dynamics at the University of Nottingham. Since 2005, his primary research interest has been in the integration of energy storage with renewables. He is a major proponent of the idea that Medium Duration Energy Storage (MDES) solutions will do the heavy-lifting of restoring flexibility in Net Zero energy systems in the future. Seamus is leading a new Task about MDES for the IEA Technology Collaboration Programme on Energy Storage and he is also one of the founders of the startup company “Cheesecake Energy Ltd” which is developing a particular flavour of compressed air energy storage system. Seamus was an active contributor to the report on Largescale Electricity Storage published in September 2023 by the Royal Society.