Origami readies battery assets for post-EFR markets
Gresham House has partnered with Habitat Energy and Origami, which will enable 40MW Glassenbury A and 10MW Cleator battery assets to participate in frequency response and wholesale markets.
The partnership will see UK energy storage fund Gresham House join with battery optimiser Habitat Energy and Origami, an independent energy technology platform for green energy assets.
Origami will be preparing battery assets with a combined capacity of 50MW to participate initially in the dynamic containment and wholesale markets. Habitat Energy will integrate with the Origami energy data platform to manage daily optimisation and revenue generation.
The announcement follows the discontinuation of National Grid’s enhanced frequency response (EFR) service.
Ben Guest, fund manager of Gresham House and managing director of New Energy at Gresham House, commented in a statement, “As the door closed on EFR, we needed to make some changes to access new markets. By using Origami’s platform, and ensuring compatibility with our trading partner’s systems, we’ve enhanced the visibility and flow of data from the sites.”
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Energy storage markets
In the fast-moving energy storage space, the canvas for ancillary grid services is in constant flux. To maximise the lifetime value of storage assets, owners need to be confident that their assets will be able to earn revenues by being dynamically optimised across the constantly changing ‘full-stack’ of revenue opportunities.
Since the discontinuation of EFR, a service in place since late 2016, numerous battery assets throughout the UK require upgrades to participate in the new markets that are replacing it. Dynamic containment, dynamic regulation and dynamic moderation are some such markets.
Gresham House aims to respond to this shift by using Origami’s platform at its 40MW Glassenbury A and 10MW Cleator projects. The hope is to manage the extraction and orchestration of operational data from the assets, enabling their participation in dynamic containment for the first time. The move also aims to futureproof the assets’ ability to switch between other current and emerging ancillary markets.
To make the assets compatible with dynamic containment, Origami is providing a combination of specialist router hardware installation and software interfacing, which will allow precisely controlled readings on battery output, capacity and condition to be generated up to 20 times a second. Having fully integrated with the Origami platform, battery optimiser Habitat Energy will use this data stream to control and optimise the batteries on behalf of Gresham House Energy Storage Fund plc.
Dan Hodges, head of commercial at Origami, stated, “Asset owners face an ongoing challenge to avoid assets becoming temporarily stranded. With the right digital infrastructure in place, these risks can be managed very effectively through swift, data-enabled actions.”
Jon Doughty, UK managing director at Habitat Energy, added: “Reliable, transparent and timely data is fundamental to not only the optimal operation of battery storage assets but the wider energy transition. We’re delighted to be working with Origami on this project with Gresham House Energy Storage Fund plc as they share our strong desire to provide best-in-class services to customers.”
