Amid the flurry of lithium-ion and virtual power plant projects in Australia, compressed air storage firm Hydrostor has quietly gained governmental approval to deliver a 5MW/10MWh compressed air energy storage facility in the country.
Hydrostor Australia, a subsidiary of the Canadian firm, plans to construct the alternative energy storage system at the unused Angas Zinc Mine outside of Adelaide, South Australia.
Plans were initially revealed in February, but the Government of South Australia only just granted permission for the project to go ahead this month.
Hydrostor has been awarded a total of AUD$9 million (US$6m) for the project— AUD$6m from the Australian Renewable Energy Agency, as part of its Advancing Renewables Program, and AUD$3m from the Government of South Australia, through its Renewable Technology Fund.
Once completed the project’s power will be dispatched into Australia’s National Electricity Market to provide synchronous inertia, load shifting and frequency regulation services, as well as delivering security of supply to the region.
Hydrostor’s facility will also enable the integration of renewable energy resources, such as solar and wind.
The technology uses electricity to run a compressor to produce heated compressed air. The air is then stored in a purpose-built underground cavern, which is kept at a constant pressure using a water column.
During charging, compressed air displaces water out of the cavern up a water column to a surface reservoir. During discharge, water flows back into the cavern forcing air to the surface under pressure, where it is re-heated using the stored heat and then expanded through a turbine to generate electricity on demand.
Pumped hydro is not a new technology. Back in 2015, BEST Battery Briefing reported on Hydrostor’s two-year pilot to test its CAES technology in Canada.
That same year Gaelectric received €6.47m ($7m) of European Union funding for its CAES project in Northern Ireland.
In 2016, Eishken Limited revealed plans to install a 300MW pumped storage hydro scheme to store renewable energy on the Isle of Lewis, Scotland.
