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Scale Microgrid Solutions Brings Indoor Farm Microgrid Online
Scale Microgrid’s modular microgrid for Fifth Season, a startup indoor farming company, uses 160 kW of photovoltaic solar panels, 200 kW of lithium ion batteries and a 1,200-kW natural gas generator outfitted with advanced emissions control technology
July 16, 2021
Scale Microgrid Solutions brought a 1.75-MW microgrid online for a major indoor farm near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
By ESstock/Shutterstock.com
Scale Microgrid’s modular microgrid for Fifth Season, a startup indoor farming company, uses 160 kW of photovoltaic solar panels, 200 kW of lithium-ion batteries, and a 1,200-kW natural gas generator outfitted with advanced emissions control technology.
The microgrid provides ancillary services to the electric grid and is expected to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 470,000 pounds a year, or the equivalent of taking 39 passenger cars off the road, according to Scale.
Fifth Season’s Braddock indoor farm uses 97% less land and up to 95% less water than traditional farming, according to Scale. Fifth Season uses robotics and artificial intelligence to grow leafy vegetables and herbs year-round.
Fifth Season needs cheap, clean and reliable power to create the ideal indoor farming environment, the Ridgewood, New Jersey-based company said.
“Fifth Season is paving the way for indoor farming, and Scale is improving their energy efficiency and grid resilience, reducing their costs and mitigating their greenhouse gas emissions,” Ryan Goodman, Scale CEO, and co-founder, said July 13.
Scale owns and operates the microgrid at the 60,000-square-foot Braddock farm under an energy-as-a-service contract. Fifth Season didn’t have to pay upfront costs for the microgrid.
The project uses Schneider Electric’s EcoStruxure Microgrid Advisor (EMA), a cloud-based, demand-side energy management software platform. EMA uses predictive and learning algorithms, which will help Scale efficiently manage the production and use of its renewable energy.
Scale and Schneider previously worked together developing a microgrid for a Bowery Farming indoor farm in New Jersey. The microgrid, commissioned in 2019, includes 815 kW of natural gas-fired generation, 150 kW of solar, and 200 kW of battery storage, according to Scale.
Scale is backed by a $300 million equity commitment from global private equity firm Warburg Pincus.
Little Leaf Farms Raises $90M to Grow Its Greenhouse Network
Massachusetts-based Little Leaf Farms has raised $90 million in a debt and equity financing round to expand its network of hydroponic greenhouses on the East Coast. The round was led by Equilibrium Capital as well as founding investors Bill Helman and Pilot House Associates. Bank of America also participated.
by Jennifer Marston
Image from: Little Leaf Farms
Massachusetts-based Little Leaf Farms has raised $90 million in a debt and equity financing round to expand its network of hydroponic greenhouses on the East Coast. The round was led by Equilibrium Capital as well as founding investors Bill Helman and Pilot House Associates. Bank of America also participated.
Little Leaf Farms says the capital is “earmarked” to build new greenhouse sites along the East Coast, where its lettuce is currently available in about 2,500 stores.
The company already operates one 10-acre greenhouse in Devins, Massachusetts. Its facility grows leafy greens using hydroponics and a mixture of sunlight supplemented by LED-powered grow lights. Rainwater captured from the facility’s roof provides most of the water used on the farm.
According to a press release, Little Leaf Farms has doubled its retail sales to $38 million since 2019. And last year, the company bought180 acres of land in Pennsylvania on which to build an additional facility. Still another greenhouse, slated for North Carolina, will serve the Southeast region of the U.S.
Little Leaf Farms joins the likes of Revol Greens, Gotham Greens, AppHarvest, and others in bringing local(ish) greens to a greater percentage of the population. These facilities generally pack and ship their greens on the day of or day after harvesting, and only supply retailers within a certain radius. Little Leaf Farms, for example, currently servers only parts of Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, New York, and New Jersey.
The list of regions the company serves will no doubt lengthen as the company builds up its greenhouse network in the coming months.
Bringing The Future To life In Abu Dhabi
A cluster of shipping containers in a city centre is about the last place you’d expect to find salad growing. Yet for the past year, vertical farming startup Madar Farms has been using this site in Masdar City, Abu Dhabi, to grow leafy green vegetables using 95 per cent less water than traditional agriculture
Amid the deserts of Abu Dhabi, a new wave of entrepreneurs and innovators are sowing the seeds of a more sustainable future.
Image from: Wired
A cluster of shipping containers in a city centre is about the last place you’d expect to find salad growing. Yet for the past year, vertical farming startup Madar Farms has been using this site in Masdar City, Abu Dhabi, to grow leafy green vegetables using 95 per cent less water than traditional agriculture.
Madar Farms is one of a number of agtech startups benefitting from a package of incentives from the Abu Dhabi Investment Office (ADIO) aimed at spurring the development of innovative solutions for sustainable desert farming. The partnership is part of ADIO’s $545 million Innovation Programme dedicated to supporting companies in high-growth areas.
“Abu Dhabi is pressing ahead with our mission to ‘turn the desert green’,” explained H.E. Dr. Tariq Bin Hendi, Director General of ADIO, in November 2020. “We have created an environment where innovative ideas can flourish and the companies we partnered with earlier this year are already propelling the growth of Abu Dhabi’s 24,000 farms.”
The pandemic has made food supply a critical concern across the entire world, combined with the effects of population growth and climate change, which are stretching the capacity of less efficient traditional farming methods. Abu Dhabi’s pioneering efforts to drive agricultural innovation have been gathering pace and look set to produce cutting-edge solutions addressing food security challenges.
Beyond work supporting the application of novel agricultural technologies, Abu Dhabi is also investing in foundational research and development to tackle this growing problem.
In December, the emirate’s recently created Advanced Technology Research Council [ATRC], responsible for defining Abu Dhabi’s R&D strategy and establishing the emirate and the wider UAE as a desired home for advanced technology talent, announced a four-year competition with a $15 million prize for food security research. Launched through ATRC’s project management arm, ASPIRE, in partnership with the XPRIZE Foundation, the award will support the development of environmentally-friendly protein alternatives with the aim to "feed the next billion".
Image from: Madar Farms
Global Challenges, Local Solutions
Food security is far from the only global challenge on the emirate’s R&D menu. In November 2020, the ATRC announced the launch of the Technology Innovation Institute (TII), created to support applied research on the key priorities of quantum research, autonomous robotics, cryptography, advanced materials, digital security, directed energy and secure systems.
“The technologies under development at TII are not randomly selected,” explains the centre’s secretary general Faisal Al Bannai. “This research will complement fields that are of national importance. Quantum technologies and cryptography are crucial for protecting critical infrastructure, for example, while directed energy research has use-cases in healthcare. But beyond this, the technologies and research of TII will have global impact.”
Future research directions will be developed by the ATRC’s ASPIRE pillar, in collaboration with stakeholders from across a diverse range of industry sectors.
“ASPIRE defines the problem, sets milestones, and monitors the progress of the projects,” Al Bannai says. “It will also make impactful decisions related to the selection of research partners and the allocation of funding, to ensure that their R&D priorities align with Abu Dhabi and the UAE's broader development goals.”
Image from: Agritecture
Nurturing Next-Generation Talent
To address these challenges, ATRC’s first initiative is a talent development programme, NexTech, which has begun the recruitment of 125 local researchers, who will work across 31 projects in collaboration with 23 world-leading research centres.
Alongside universities and research institutes from across the US, the UK, Europe and South America, these partners include Abu Dhabi’s own Khalifa University, and Mohamed bin Zayed University of Artificial Intelligence, the world’s first graduate-level institute focused on artificial intelligence.
“Our aim is to up skill the researchers by allowing them to work across various disciplines in collaboration with world-renowned experts,” Al Bannai says.
Beyond academic collaborators, TII is also working with a number of industry partners, such as hyperloop technology company, Virgin Hyperloop. Such industry collaborations, Al Bannai points out, are essential to ensuring that TII research directly tackles relevant problems and has a smooth path to commercial impact in order to fuel job creation across the UAE.
“By engaging with top global talent, universities and research institutions and industry players, TII connects an intellectual community,” he says. “This reinforces Abu Dhabi and the UAE’s status as a global hub for innovation and contributes to the broader development of the knowledge-based economy.”
Farm In A Box Planned For Bridgeport's East End
BRIDGEPORT — You will not find any vast acres of fertile soil and crops in the East End neighbourhood. So the state, city and area activists have teamed with an entrepreneur on what they all said they believe is the next best thing: farmland in a box
Image from: CT Post
BRIDGEPORT — You will not find any vast acres of fertile soil and crops in the East End neighbourhood. So the state, city and area activists have teamed with an entrepreneur on what they all said they believe is the next best thing: farmland in a box.
Joe Alvarez, founder of High Ridge Hydroponics of Ridgefield, describes it on his website as “an indoor, vertical, hydroponic, shipping container farm to be located in the most urban settings throughout the world.” And the East End — which has been labeled a “food desert” because of the lack of fresh edibles easily available to residents there — will be that urban setting.
“We’re very excited about this,” Keith Williams, head of the East End Neighborhood Revitalization Zone community group, said during a teleconference Friday announcing a $49,999 state grant for Alvarez’s project. “Fresh vegetables. Healthy. That’s what we’re all about — healthy eating.”
High Ridge’s container will produce young micro-greens from broccoli, kale, cabbage, arugula and other plants to be sold at the East End NRZ’s market as a salad mix.
“These greens are harvested after only 10 to 14 days from being planted, which is extremely quick (and) they are super concentrated in nutrition,” Alvarez said.
Friday’s teleconference included several dignitaries who pledged to do everything they can to ensure High Ridge’s success in town, including Lt. Gov. Susan Bysiewicz, state Agriculture Commissioner Bryan Hurlburt, state Sen. Marilyn Moore, state Rep. Andre Baker, Mayor Joe Ganim and Edward Lavernoich of the Bridgeport Economic Development Corporation.
“I hope this project has a lasting and positive impact on your community,” Bysiewicz said. “And I hope it will become a model for other urban areas in our state to grow their own food using innovative technology and techniques.”
“This is not just a shipping container in the city,” Hurlburt said. “This is a much larger, deeper and richer project that we get to celebrate today.”
State Rep. Joe Gresko, D-Stratford, was also included, but wearing a different hat. Gresko works for Ganim continuing a mission started by former Mayor Bill Finch to turn Bridgeport from an ex-manufacturing hub into a leader in the green and environmentally sustainable economy.
It was under Finch that the East End was previously promised an urban green house on the site of the former “Mt. Trashmore” illegal dump. That project, dubbed “Boot Camp Farms” because it would hire veterans, was announced in 2013 and was also supposed to have financial backing from the state. But the developers had no prior experience in that field and the proposal never broke ground.
Alvarez, according to his online biography, “studied environmental science at Fordham University in New York City, graduated in May of 2017 (and) has worked as a private organic gardener, an aquaponic farmer, built greenhouses, maintained greenhouses and designed several custom hydroponic growing systems.”
Hurlburt said he felt confident the new project would be a success.
Alvarez “has limited experience but he knows what he’s doing. ... I know how much Joe was calling us and emailing us and how badly he wanted this grant to make it a reality. I know his heart is right where it needs to be to make it a success.”
“We’re all in this together to make sure Joe has the support he needs to be successful,” Hurlburt emphasized.
There are still important details to be finalized, including getting a site for the shipping container and additional money to cover the full, nearly $150,000 cost. Gresko said that the NRZ was negotiating to use some property and that “when the time comes” Bridgeport will “match” additional private funds Alvarez obtains.
“We’re going to keep an eye on this and troubleshoot as we go forward any issues,” Gresko said.
Alvarez said he hopes to complete construction by the fall. And the colder months are when his crops will be the most needed, said Deborah Sims, who operates the NRZ market.
“After farmer’s market season is over, we have difficulty sourcing (fresh food),” Sims said.
“Three hundred sixty five (days) we’re going to have the greens available,” said Gresko.
Baker recalled how his East End funeral home has hosted some farmer’s markets and called the High Ridge project “a long time coming.” He also told Bysiewicz he hoped similar initiatives to offer more fresh food to his constituents will follow.
“Lieutenant governor, we’re going to be leaning on you and the governor for more support,” he said. “You’re going to hear more from us.”
Microgrids, Indoor Agriculture Go Together Like Peas And Carrots
In the last year and a half, Schneider has announced deals with Fifth Season and Bowery Farming, two vertical farming startups
Friday, March 6, 2020
Bowery FarmingBowery Farming is one of two vertical farming startups that has signed an energy as a service arrangement with Schneider Electric and Scale Microgrid.
Plant factories may be the technology we need to feed a growing and warming planet.
The operations, which have no access to natural sunlight and grow plants in vertical rows, are designed to be incredibly efficient. They require 95 percent less water and 99 percent less land than conventional farms while growing leafy greens with scientific precision without pesticides. Because of their small physical footprint, vertical farms also can produce food close to the urban areas where it will be consumed, reducing the need for transportation and logistics.
The tradeoff: Indoor agriculture demands a staggering amount of energy. Lights run 16 hours a day and facilities require impressive HVAC equipment, reaching an energy intensity per square foot that surpasses datacenters. The energy load varies greatly depending on the size and type of operations, but it could be between 500 kilowatts and 15 megawatts — more than a retail box store and less than a data farm.
Schneider Electric sees an opportunity here. The international service provider has identified indoor agriculture as one of the four major drivers that will increase electricity consumption in the next decade (the others being the electrification of heat, electric vehicles and data centers).
In partnership with Scale Microgrid Solutions, Schneider is extending its energy-as-a-service model to indoor agriculture companies. Under the arrangement, Scale finances, builds and maintains an onsite microgrid and sells the energy to the off-taker — in this case, indoor farming startups.
In the last year and a half, Schneider has announced deals with Fifth Season and Bowery Farming, two vertical farming startups.
Shutterstock
Three reasons microgrids are well suited to meet indoor farming’s blooming energy demands
1. Microgrids can help grow operations get online faster
Many facilities aren’t equipped to meet the electricity demands of an indoor agriculture operation. Upgrading the facility could take anywhere between six months and a year and a half and could cost millions of dollars, according to Mark Feasel, president of the smart grid at Schneider Electric.
"These are not trivial loads," Feasel said in a phone conversation. "There may or may not be the capacity on the grid to handle these loads, especially as you move towards metropolitan areas where electrical distribution can be constrained."
Not only can the upgrade take a lot of time, it can be really expensive. Depending on the utility, there may need to be ecosystem studies and a grid feasibility assessment, along with a slew of technical and environmental regulations that can slow the timeline and increase costs.
2. It’s on-brand
On-site electricity generation is kind of like harvesting your own energy to grow your own plants. It’s a technological intermediary between the sun and photosynthesis. Because microgrids can run in island mode, this adds resilience to operations.
Microgrids also can provide lower-carbon energy. Running an operation off dirty energy would take a bite out of the startup’s sustainability proposition. After all, it seems silly to burn fossil fuels to create artificial sunlight.
Schneider and Scale’s microgrids use a combination of solar and natural gas, which the company says is cleaner than the grid electricity. The company is exploring ways to have completely clean microgrids, but there are space constraints for the number of solar panels needed for the energy intensity of plant farms, Feasel said. One farm likely would need many multiples of surface area to meet the demand inside the building, which may be difficult in urban areas.
3. Energy-as-a-service offers price certainty
Energy represents a major line item for indoor agriculture, accounting for 30 to 50 percent of the operational expenses at a plant factory. That’s according to unpublished research conducted by Centrica Ventures’ Logan Ashcraft, XENDEE’s Zachary Pecenak, Energy Impact Partner’s Shayle Kann and Kale Harbick from the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
With Schneider and Scale’s energy-as-a-service model, the startup will know the cost of energy in the future, making it easier to create a business plan and attract investors.
"If we can provide a fixed energy price over a long period of time, this could be 10, 15, 20 years, they can optimize their balance sheet," Feasel said. "It provides energy certainty and less risk around the cost of energy."
The cost per kilowatt-hour (kWh) varies from service territory and project, but Feasel said it’s in the range of 10 to 15 cents per kWh, competitive with average industrial energy rates, depending on the region.
Plant factories have a unique energy load profile. They’re incredibly energy-intense for three-quarters of the day, and then shed most of their loads when the lights turn off.
However, it’s unclear if this price for electricity will work for indoor farm operations in the long run. Ashcraft’s analysis shows that a farm would need a price of between 7 to 9 cents per kWh to break even. Matt Barnard, CEO of the vertical farming startup Plenty, pegged the desired cost even lower, saying the company would need 3 to 5 cents per kWH to succeed.
"This question gets to the heart of whether this industry will be able to succeed and scale. It’s a discussion of unit economics," Ashcraft said. "These are growing commodities. And they’re forced to compete with commodity prices at the grocery store. I have not seen any evidence that consumers are willing to pay any multiple of any price for produce."
Still, the market is young, and capital is flowing to technological innovations. The Union Bank of Switzerland predicts food innovation will be a $700 billion market by 2030 a fivefold increase from 2018, meaning financial markets are investing in making rethinking food. Fifth Season has raised $35 million in finance, Bowery has raised $172.5 million and Plenty has raised $260 million, thanks to Jeff Bezos and SoftBank, so the startups may have wiggle room to work on efficiencies and economies.
The unique opportunities and challenges of indoor agriculture
Plant factories have a unique energy load profile. They’re incredibly energy-intense for three-quarters of the day, and then shed most of their loads when the lights turn off and the plants get tucked into their vertical bunks for the night.
Plants don’t care when "night" comes, meaning operators have the opportunity to respond to utility price signals. This flexibility is different from more finicky power loads, such as data centers, which must have constant electricity to function.
For example, if the grid has excess solar capacity in the middle of the day, plant farms could suck that up. Then when peak rates hit, the plants could start their "night" cycle. If done well, and if located in a service territory with a friendly utility and regulator, indoor agriculture operations could achieve lower rates while benefiting the grid.
To hear more about how this works, check out Ashcraft and Kann’s conversation on The Interchange in 2018.
Scale’s microgrids come with Schneider’s energy management software platform "EcoStruxure Microgrid Advisor." This system could be attractive to indoor agriculture startups that are putting its brain power behind getting the plants right, not energy management. The tradeoff is that the startup then would split the upside with Scale and Schneider. Not a bad deal, as long as the economics work.
This article is adapted from GreenBiz's newsletter Energy Weekly, running Thursdays. Subscribe here.
Topics: Renewable Energy Food Systems
Tags: Microgrids urban agriculture
US (PA): 60,000 Square Foot Vertical Farm To Be Powered By Microgrid
Schneider Electric and Scale Microgrid Solutions will design, build and finance a microgrid for Fifth Season
Schneider Electric and Scale Microgrid Solutions will design, build and finance a microgrid for Fifth Season. Scale Microgrid Solutions will design, build, own, and operate the system for Fifth Season, utilizing its standardized microgrid modules. The microgrid will leverage Schneider Electric battery storage, switchgear, and advanced controls technology to deliver sustainable and dynamic energy management for Fifth Season's newest, highly autonomous vertical farm in Pittsburgh, PA.
The Fifth Season microgrid combines distributed energy resources, including a rooftop solar array, a battery energy storage system, a natural gas generator equipped with advanced emissions control technologies, and Fifth Season's precision agriculture platform to help the company reach its goal of efficiently producing 500,000 lbs. of local produce during the new facility's first year of full operation.
"Our vertical farm in Pittsburgh is reconnecting consumers to locally grown fresh food. This is a first step in solving some of the largest problems facing society caused by the broken food system, however, this industry must achieve long term economic and environmental sustainability," said Grant Vandenbussche, Chief Category Officer at Fifth Season. "This microgrid enables our journey to create a sustainable system that delivers healthier, fresher greens to local communities through both economic and environmental efficiencies."
The microgrid is being financed by Scale Microgrid Solutions' microgrid-as-a-service business model, helping Fifth Season save capital that can be used toward additional operational investments, while also immediately benefiting from more efficient, sustainable and economic energy consumption. Commissioning of the full energy system is scheduled for mid-2020 and it will be the first site of several that are to be constructed for Fifth Season in the next three years.
"Fifth Season is cognizant that vertical farming facilities can be energy-intensive and by pairing solar generation with batteries to work with the grid, they will enable demand response, peak shaving and time of use pricing," said Drew Gravitt, a manager leading microgrid economic optimization business development for Schneider Electric. "We're excited to work alongside Scale Microgrid Solutions to help Fifth Season improve energy resilience and cost while enabling renewable integration to meet its clean energy targets."
For more information:
www.se.com
www.scalemicrogridsolutions.com
www.fifthseasonfresh.com
Publication date: Thu 30 Jan 2020
History of Microgrids In The US: From Pearl Street To Plug-and-Play
While it may seem that microgrids are new, the history of microgrids shows they have been around in some form for years in the US
July 22, 2019
By Lisa Cohn
While it may seem that microgrids are new, the history of microgrids shows they have been around in some form for years in the US — although they haven’t always been called microgrids. The first one was introduced by Thomas Edison in 1882 at his Pearl Street Station, which combined heat and power and produced electricity and thermal energy.
The Battery and Control Room in the first Edison Electric Lighting Station at Pearl Street in lower Manhattan in 1882. By Everett Historical/Shutterstock.com
In fact, campuses have been using microgrids for decades and have shown that microgrids are compatible with local utility grids and provide benefits to both the campuses and the larger grids.
Universities were ideal early adapters of microgrids because they have large, easily defined loads. In addition, many campuses have physical plants that provide steam for heating.
As a result, an upgrade to combined heat and power (CHP) microgrid makes sense in many cases. CHP technology allows them to produce both electricity and steam from a single fuel, which dramatically boosts the efficiency of the system.
Campuses with microgrids include Wesleyan University, Harvard University, Princeton University and the University of California at San Diego (UCSD). One of the biggest microgrids in the US is at the University of Texas at Austin, which can supply all of the university’s power, heating and cooling needs.
In the late 1990s, Congress was concerned about the reliability of national electricity transmission, and asked the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) for guidance. The conversation focused on maximizing distributed generation to reduce stress on the grid. A number of research projects were launched over the years, leading to demonstration projects of microgrid technology for utilities, universities, industry, school districts, jails, hospitals, laboratories, military bases and industrial parks.
Pivotal event in history of microgrids: Superstorm Sandy
A series of severe storms from 2011-2012 in the Northeast heightened interest in microgrids, the most destructive being Superstorm Sandy. Microgrid operators, like Princeton University, showcased how microgrid technology kept power on when the central grid failed during Sandy.
Efforts to rebuild the electricity infrastructure prompted people to ask questions about how to better prepare in the future. This helped raise awareness about microgrids and distributed energy.
A handful of states played a big role in the history of microgrids, among them California, Connecticut, illinois, Massachuetts, New Jersey and New York.
For example, in 2013 Connecticut became the first state to offer microgrid funding when it announced its Microgrid Pilot Program. Nine microgrid projects were awarded $18 million in funding through the first round.
The program is now in its fourth round of funding, awarding up to $30 million to microgrid projects. Award recipients have included two campuses, Trinity College and Wesleyan University, a family-owned dairy farm and pet shelter, the town of Coventry, and even an apartment complex.
The Ameren Microgrid in Champaign, Illinois, August 2017. Photo courtesy Ameren Illinois
In 2014, New York created the New York Prize, a $40 million competition launched to offer money to those who plan on developing community microgrids. The initiative was created to find microgrids that could be easily replicated and used as models for other communities nationwide.
On the other side of the country, in 2016, the California Energy Commission (CEC) met to began working on a new microgrid roadmap, created to encourage microgrid development in California. The roadmap identifies the top barriers to microgrid commercialization and examines ways to improve commercialization and standardization.
Initially, the CEC cited as barriers lack of policies and regulations that enable microgrids, plus interconnection rules that impose limitations on microgrids. The CEC has since awarded almost $80 million in grants.
Clustering microgrids
Another big moment in the history of microgrids came when Illinois regulators approved Commonwealth Edison’s microgrid cluster in Chicago in 2018. The $25 million project — the first utility-scale microgrid cluster in the nation — is designed to help teach utilities how to integrate microgrids with renewable energy resources and how to maximize the efficiency and value of two microgrids that interact with one another. The microgrid will directly serve more than 1,000 residential, commercial, and small industrial customers in the South Side of Chicago.
A national security play
Along with these programs that gave microgrids a boost, the US Military has been an enthusiastic early adapter of microgrids in efforts to ensure the power stays on in mission-critical operations. The military has for many years relied on small, isolated, self-contained grids in remote locations. More recently, the modern microgrid has altered the way the military and the federal government approach reliability and sustainability.
The federal government realized that a military base could install solar panels for some portion of its load to help achieve renewable goals while also making the base more resilient and self-sufficient. The Navy was one of the first branches of the military to build microgrids, installing one at the hospital Navy Base in San Diego. Since then, the military has installed several others including sophisticated projects at Marine Corps Air Station (MCAS) in San Diego and the US Marine Corps Recruit Depot (MCRD) Parris Island, South Carolina.
Evolution of microgrid financing
While microgrid awareness and interest was building among the military and others, acquiring the financing to build the microgrids was challenging. Commercial building structures, ownership and leasing arrangements all varied considerably, which made financing specific to the project and therefore difficult.
While it made sense logically to build microgrids, it didn’t yet make sense financially or operationally for many businesses. Financiers were not set up to finance projects that were small and specific to each individual project. This has changed in recent years because of models that derisk the investment for customers. These are offered under such names as microgrid-as-a-service, reliability-as-a-service, and energy as a service (EaaS).
These approaches convert a long-term capital expenditure to a short-term operational expense, thus keeping a large capital expense off a company’s books. Commercial customers can take on projects with no uprfont capital spending. Instead, a third party or financier typically owns the equipment and the customer pays a service fee, much like a monthly utility bill. Agreements vary on a case-by-case basis.
Product differentiation emerges
As microgrid use has expanded, so has its applications. Microgrids at first were viewed as a way to increase reliability, keeping the power on when the central grid failed. Their applications have widened into carbon efficiency. Wider adoption of microgrid technology has also been buoyed by cities, states, corporations and campuses that have set sustainability or carbon-emissions reduction goals. These have helped drive development of clean energy microgrids – those that incorporate renewables. Newer microgrids often use solar panels or wind turbines, and more are beginning to emerge that incorporate electric vehicle charging stations.
The military microgrid on Parris Island. Photo courtesy of Ameresco
Microgrids also are used to keep energy costs in check, as developers become increasingly adept at employing financing innovations and state and federal renewable energy incentives to lower energy costs. Sophisticated microgrids can participate in certain wholesale markets and leverage their assets to reduce costs.
As microgrid applications have expanded, they have entered the phase of product differentiation, which has led to many different types of microgrids, from fractal microgrids to virtual, blockchain, flying, sailing and more. At this time, NRG offers asset-backed demand response microgrids that focus on providing demand response and S&C Electric provides non-wires alternatives, which allow utilities to avoid investing in traditional poles and wires. And while microgrids continue to be highly customized products, the industry also is working on refining simple plug-and-play microgrids that can be manufactured in a replicable fashion and in some cases be installed in a day.
Today microgrids can be found at a broad range of commercial, institutional, industrial, community and government facilities. But residential microgrids remain rare, although some do exist, including one at the ranch of former California Gov. Jerry Brown. And some home developers are beginning to install neighborhood microgrids, but they too remain unusual.
Even though the history of microgrids spans for more than a hundred years, it’s been the last six that have brought growth in the leaps and bounds. Numerous drivers suggest it’s just the start of a lengthy buildup of microgrids in the US.
If you found this article on the history of microgrids helpful, subscribe to the free Microgrid Knowledge newsletter for more news and information about the growing industry.
Microgrid At The Center of $630 Million London City Airport Expansion
The London City Airport microgrid, now under development, will nearly double the size of the airport’s electricity distribution infrastructure, from 3.6 MVA to 7 MVA, and help power a major airport expansion and upgrade.
July 8, 2019 By Andrew Burger
The London City Airport microgrid, now under development, will nearly double the size of the airport’s electricity distribution infrastructure, from 3.6 MVA to 7 MVA, and help power a major airport expansion and upgrade.
Photo by Londons Finest Eye/Shutterstock.com
The microgrid is a critical element of the airport’s broader $630.5 million City Airport Development Program, which includes construction of a new terminal four times the size of the airport’s current terminal and the first digital air traffic control tower in the world for an airport of its size, The microgrid is scheduled to come online in phases through 2022 and into 2023.
The airport’s development transformation program “is central to the airport’s plans to help tackle the climate challenge and operate sustainably to achieve their net-zero carbon emissions goal by 2050,” said Tony Blackwell, design & interface manager for UK Power Networks Services (UKPNS), which operates the London City Airport’s existing electricity network.
Blackwell declined to provide the microgrid project’s total cost. He did explain that the cost of the microgrid will be incorporated within UKPNS’ existing Marketspur Agreement with London City Airport, which runs until 2033. UKPNS is designing, building, operating, maintaining and financing the microgrid.
One of most complex and demanding networks
UKPNS’ distribution management system will be the centerpiece of the microgrid and the airport’s new, much larger electricity distribution network, providing full remote control and systems automation and rapid fault response to the high-voltage distribution network.
“UK Power Networks’ ability to provide disaster recovery service from their control center will ensure that the operations are secure,” Blackwell said in an interview with Microgrid Knowledge. “The disaster recovery service is provided by an experienced team which controls the whole of the south east of the UK’s distribution network including London and will provide 24/7, 365 support to the dedicated UK Power Networks Services’ operations and maintenance team.
He added: “This experience is unmatched within our industry, since this network is one of the most complex, demanding and includes one of the most critical cities in the world with a very high availability rate of electrical infrastructure.”
The London City Airport microgrid will incorporate solar and combined heat and power (CHP) and a new, smart SCADA (supervisory control and data acquisition) system. It’s designed to enhance energy security and resilience while at the same time reducing infrastructure costs. The project also is designed to help improve the air quality around the airport and meet London’s citywide decarbonization goals.
The CHP and PV systems will be linked to the airport’s building management system, Blackwell said. Both systems are in their detailed design stages. Plans call for a solar PV system with a capacity of about 140 MWh and a CHP plant of 230 kW, as well as a second CHP unit of the same size in the future.
Microgrids are “Holy Grail”
Sustainable development is an airport priority. The facility has reduced its per-passenger carbon emissions 28% since 2013 and holds Level 3 Airport Carbon Accreditation. Its goal is to be carbon-neutral in terms of emissions by 2020. It is the closest airport to London’s city center and nearly 70% of the airport’s passengers arrive and leave via public transports — the highest proportion among all UK airports and something the airport actively encourages, according to UKPNS.
Airports in the US also have been showing interest in investing and deploying microgrids in recent years, a trend that picked up momentum in the wake of a 90-minute utility grid outage at Reagan International Airport in Washington, D.C. in August 2018 and an 11-hour power outage at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport in February 2018.
For example, AlphaStruxure, a joint venture of Schneider Electric and The Carlyle Group, is developing multiple microgrids as part of the modernization of JFK Airport in New York.
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In Pennsylvania, Allegheny County Airport Authority is planning a microgrid for the Pittsburgh International Airport. And in Tennessee, the Chattanooga Electric Power Board and partners are working on a “dynamic boundaries” microgrid with an open-source controller for the Chattanooga Airport that would link into existing automated switch gear and hence to the utility’s smart grid network.
“Microgrids are the holy grail of new sustainable renewable energy networks. Finding ways to make microgrids economically viable and self-funding has challenged global energy markets for decades,” said UKPNS Director Ian Smyth. “We are excited to deliver this turnkey solution for our valued client. Our ability to bring these technologies together delivers triple bottom line benefits for the airport — lower cost, greater resilience and help towards the UK’s decarbonization agenda.”
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Solar Microgrid To Power Indoor Farm All Year Round
So you want to buy local produce, but you also want strawberries in December? Soon you can have your cake – scratch that – vegetables, and eat them too. Up to 100 varieties of vegetables, including lettuce and kale, will soon be grown in an indoor warehouse in New Jersey, supported by a solar microgrid to keep plants growing all year round.
Bowery Farming’s facility will be be powered by batteries, solar panels, and on-site gas generators to enable it to operate independently from the electric grid. Scale Microgrid Solutions will build, own and operate the microgrid, and Schneider Electric will provide most of the infrastructure and software for the indoor farm.
Bowery is well acquainted with high-tech agriculture, making waves with its “post-organic” vertical farming which landed it $20 million in investment in 2017. In fact, its produce is grown in trays and requires no soil at all, using 95% less water than traditional farming due to a finely-tuned hydroponic system. Now, it is adding microgrids to its tech-repertoire.
One doesn’t normally associate microgrids with the realm of agriculture, and Scale Microgrid Solutions CEO Ryan Goodman thinks it might a first. “I believe no one has ever done microgrids in the indoor agricultural space like we’re doing here,” Goodman said, according to the Energy News Network. “There are some differences, but primarily they’re related to the load profile and how we’re using the assets.”
15% of the power will come from solar, while some of the power will still come from the grid, and the rest from the natural gas generator and batteries. So while New Jersey winters will bring cold winters, with short days lacking in sunlight, the indoor farm will be unaffected. Schneider Electric’s lithium-ion battery energy storage system will store solar energy that can be released to lower demand from the grid.
Schneider currently has more than 300 microgrid projects on the go in the US, and is using its EcoStruxure Microgrid Advisor software platform for cloud-connected, demand-side energy management. It’s integrated into the system to enable a look at current electric rate tariffs and optimization of energy usage – but does so faster than any human could.
This, combined with Bowery’s hydroponic system that uses 95% less water than is normally needed to grow plants, enables the creation of a super high-tech urban agriculture startup that will perhaps change the way we think about farming. Bowery Farming is set to begin the microgrid project this year, we can’t wait to see some tasty results.
Images: Bowery Farming
Tags: Bowery Farming, New Jersey, Scale Microgrid Solutions, schneider electric, vertical farming
About the Author
Erika Clugston Erika is a writer and artist based in Berlin. She is passionate about sharing stories of climate change and cleantech initiatives worldwide. Whether it’s transforming the fashion, food, or engineering industries, there’s an opportunity and responsibility for us all to do better. In addition to contributing to CleanTechnica, Erika is the Web and Social Media Editor at LOLA Magazine and writes regularly about art and culture.
Here’s What’s Driving Energy Storage Markets — And How to Benefit
Energy storage markets are growing quickly, driven by regulations, demand charges, plus utilities’ need to integrate solar into the grid and avoid building new peaking power plants
March 1, 2019
By Lisa Cohn
Energy storage markets are growing quickly, driven by regulations, demand charges, plus utilities’ need to integrate solar into the grid and avoid building new peaking power plants.
By SergeyIT/Shutterstock.com
In fact, innovative utility-scale energy storage projects are popping up across the nation, with utilities and cities using storage to avoid building underground transmission, escape high demand charges from independent system operators and integrate more renewable power into the grid.
What’s more, used electric vehicle (EV) batteries are expected to drive battery prices down in the future, further boosting the market, said Peter Kelly-Detwiler, Northbridge Energy Partners principal. He was summarizing the messages from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s (MIT) Enterprise Forum’s event Feb. 27, “Energy Storage: New Business Models Fuel Rapid Growth.”
The forum aimed to advise startups about how best to thrive in the growing markets. One warning, Kelly-Detwiler said: Companies shouldn’t be too enamored of their technologies. They need to find markets for their products and be prepared to flex as markets change.
“They need to focus on where to play, how to work the markets and who wants to buy their products and services,” said Kelly-Detwiler, who moderated the event.
Role of states, FERC
Understanding the bigger picture means keeping up with leading state legislation, including efforts in California, Massachusetts, Maryland and New York.
Massachusetts, for example, recently committed to boosting solar-plus-battery energy storage for the grid in two decisions. The Massachusetts Department of Public Utilities focused on net metering for solar-plus-storage projects and also on the capacity ownership rights of projects.
The Maryland Energy Administration (MEA) is now accepting applications for its 2019 Energy Storage Tax Credit program, which aims to boost the use of storage by homes and businesses in the state. It was the first state to pass a bill allowing taxpayers to claim an income tax credit on energy storage.
Andin an important move, the California Public Utilities Commission on Jan 11 approved proposed rules allowing “stacking” of energy storage — using energy storage to provide multiple benefits and services. Resources can be compensated for their full economic value.
In addition, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), in Order 841 directed all grid operators to propose models for the participation of storage as a wholesale generation asset, said Kelly-Detwiler.
But these regulations — only a few examples of what’s happening across the country — aren’t the only market drivers.
Another opportunity is addressing the “duck curves” created by high solar production — in California, Massachusetts and elsewhere.
Many facility operators need increased resiliency, efficiently, and sustainability. Distributed Energy Resources (DERs) like wind, PV and energy storage can address these needs. Yet also introduce many other challenges. To learn how microgrids can help you optimize the integration of these assets, download this white paper.
“One April in Massachusetts, demand was higher in the night than in the middle of the middle of day,” said Kelly-Detwiler. “There are pretty good opportunities in these cases for storage to mitigate the intermittency of solar.”
In addition, utilities are beginning to embrace storage to help manage their grids, he said.
For example, both the municipal utility in Princeton, Mass. and Vermont’s Green Mountain Power use storage to mitigate demand charges from ISO New England, he said.
Martha’s Vineyard, an island off the coast of Massachusetts, is turning to storage to help reduce carbon emissions and avoid building or upgrading expensive underwater transmission lines, said Kelly-Detwiler. Eversource has proposed an energy storage project on the island that aims to reduce emissions from five diesel generators and help meet demand for electricity.
Energy storage is helping utilities in other areas of the country avoid building expensive peak power plants, Kelly-Detwiler said.
For example, Arizona Public Service has contracted with AES for a 10-MW/40-MWh storage system that will provide peaking capacity. Arizona utilities are grappling with changing peaks due to high solar penetration.
MIT Enterprise Forum Event, Photo Courtesy Chris Carleton, Chen PR
How rates drive energy storage markets
High demand charges are also boosting demand for energy storage.
In California, up to 50 percent of utility bills can come from demand charges, said Kelly-Detwiler.
Storage provider Stem is aggregating behind-the-meter energy storage to lower these charges, he added. Stem says it now has hundreds of systems up and running, many in California, where the high demand charges along with state incentives have created a large market for behind-the-meter storage. Stem is also building a 235-kWh energy storage system for the City of Huntington Beach’s Civic Center to help the city avoid demand charges. The system will work alongside 2 MW of solar.
Changing time-of-use rates are also boosting the market for storage, said Kelly-Detwiler. San Diego Gas & Electric has implemented time-of-use rates with peak prices as high as 50 cents/kWh, he said.
“The prices are so high, people are using storage to shift away from those hours,” he said. As a result, companies like Sunrun are adding storage to their solar offerings. During Sunrun’s third quarter of 2018, the company installed a record number of solar energy and home batteries, the company said.
“Demand charges and time-of-use rates are driving this,” said Kelly-Detwiler.
Used batteries to flood market, drive down prices
Used EV batteries are expected to start playing an important role in energy storage markets, driving down the price of batteries.
In Amsterdam, the Johan Cruijff Arena, a football stadium, employs used and new EV batteries to store up to 3 MW of solar power. The battery system also provides power to the grid.
“Used EV batteries still have 80 percent of their value when they come out of cars,” said Kelly-Detwiler. “Within a few years, we’re going to be flooded with cheap, useful batteries.”
With all these developments in energy storage markets across the country, startups need to keep their eyes open and adapt quickly as new markets open up, Kelly-Detwiler said.
“Startups need to understand the bigger picture, the context,” he said. “They need to pay attention to what’s happening across the country.”
Solar Microgrid To Power Indoor Farm All Year Round
January 22nd, 2019 by Erika Clugston
So you want to buy local produce, but you also want strawberries in December? Soon you can have your cake – scratch that – vegetables, and eat them too. Up to 100 varieties of vegetables, including lettuce and kale, will soon be grown in an indoor warehouse in New Jersey, supported by a solar microgrid to keep plants growing all year round.
Photo by Jatuphon Buraphon, via Pexels
Bowery Farming’s facility will be be powered by batteries, solar panels, and on-site gas generators to enable it to operate independently from the electric grid. Scale Microgrid Solutions will build, own and operate the microgrid, and Schneider Electric will provide most of the infrastructure and software for the indoor farm.
Bowery is well acquainted with high-tech agriculture, making waves with its “post-organic” vertical farming which landed it $20 million in investment in 2017. In fact, its produce is grown in trays and requires no soil at all, using 95% less water than traditional farming due to a finely-tuned hydroponic system. Now, it is adding microgrids to its tech-repertoire.
One doesn’t normally associate microgrids with the realm of agriculture, and Scale Microgrid Solutions CEO Ryan Goodman thinks it might a first. “I believe no one has ever done microgrids in the indoor agricultural space like we’re doing here,” Goodman said, according to the Energy News Network. “There are some differences, but primarily they’re related to the load profile and how we’re using the assets.”
15% of the power will come from solar, while some of the power will still come from the grid, and the rest from the natural gas generator and batteries. So while New Jersey winters will bring cold winters, with short days lacking in sunlight, the indoor farm will be unaffected. Schneider Electric’s lithium-ion battery energy storage system will store solar energy that can be released to lower demand from the grid.
Schneider currently has more than 300 microgrid projects on the go in the US, and is using its EcoStruxure Microgrid Advisor software platform for cloud-connected, demand-side energy management. It’s integrated into the system to enable a look at current electric rate tariffs and optimization of energy usage – but does so faster than any human could.
This, combined with Bowery’s hydroponic system that uses 95% less water than is normally needed to grow plants, enables the creation of a super high-tech urban agriculture startup that will perhaps change the way we think about farming. Bowery Farming is set to begin the microgrid project this year, we can’t wait to see some tasty results.
Indoor Farm Will Tap Solar Microgrid To Keep Plants Growing Year-Round
The Bowery Farming facility, inside a converted warehouse in Kearny, New Jersey.
WRITTEN BY Bill Opalka | January 4, 2019
PHOTO BY Bowery Farming
Bowery Farming’s New Jersey factory will include energy storage, solar panels, and on-site gas generation.
A solar-powered microgrid will soon help an urban agriculture startup grow vegetable greens inside a converted New Jersey warehouse.
Bowery Farming’s Kearny, New Jersey, facility will grow lettuce, kale and up to 100 varieties of plants, all indoors in a carefully controlled climate backed up by batteries, solar panels, on-site gas generators and technology that allows it to operate independently from the electric grid in the event of an outage or other disruptions.
“It’s really a manufacturing center with a high cost of energy in a very controlled environment,” said Don Wingate, vice president for utility and microgrid solutions with Schneider Electric, a Chicago-based company providing much of the infrastructure, controls and software for the high-tech food factory.
The microgrid will be built, owned and operated by Scale Microgrid Solutions, whose CEO Ryan Goodman said the platform is similar to what is offered in its standardized product, but it’s a first for this type of use.
“I believe no one has ever done microgrids in the indoor agricultural space like we’re doing here,” Goodman said. “There are some differences, but primarily they’re related to the load profile and how we’re using the assets.”
Microgrids are becoming increasingly popular to support uninterrupted operation of critical infrastructure like emergency and public safety buildings, hospitals, and sites that need a guaranteed power supply like data centers. In an agricultural setting, especially in the Northeast with hot summers and colder winters with shorter days, a stable, climate-controlled environment is required for plants that thrive in moderate temperatures.
The farm will run on grid power for part of its needs. Solar will provide about 15 percent of the energy required. The natural gas generator and batteries will provide the rest.
“Our assets can do a bunch of things, but in this case our natural gas product and the battery help primarily to manage peak loads,” Goodman said.
‘I believe no one has ever done microgrids in the indoor agricultural space like we’re doing here.’
The load profile is advantageous, as solar energy production peaks as overall grid demand rises and energy costs increase. Power stored in the on-site batteries could then be released to lower demand from the grid.
Goodman said the system will use the three assets in an optimal way, based on the load profile and the value proposition presented by opportunities for peak shaving and demand response.
“Generically, a solution like this would provide a 20 or 30 percent savings in energy consumption from the normal cost structure of a similar facility,” Goodman said.
Technically, the Scale system is capable of dispatching power back to the grid, but there are no plans to do that now.
The system includes Schneider Electric’s lithium-ion battery energy storage system interconnected in a behind-the-meter configuration.
“This new industry of indoor agriculture is really meaningful to society and us being able to partner in a project like this, to make repeatable solutions to make energy use much more efficient and more affordable, makes this much more exciting,” Wingate said. Schneider says it has a stable of more than 300 microgrid projects in the U.S.
Schneider Electric’s EcoStruxure Microgrid Advisor is a cloud-connected, demand-side energy management software platform that will be integrated to optimize the system’s performance. Its top layer includes cloud-connected demand side energy software that looks at current electric rate tariffs as part of its process to optimize energy use and make informed suggestions to the system. That advanced microgrid solution operates seamlessly and faster than any human being could to intervene.
The infrastructure can be built to scale and added to as necessary, Wingate said.
“As microgrids have become more cost-efficient and simpler, it’s more affordable to phase in additional pieces without having to re-engineer the entire system from the beginning,” he added.
Bowery said the indoor farm will be in production all year in a hydroponic system that uses 95 percent less water than plants grown by traditional methods out of doors. It claims crop cycles are twice as fast as traditional farming and its land footprint is 100 times less than outdoor agriculture.
The company hopes to expand to other metropolitan regions so crops can be delivered promptly to its markets. Bowery would not say how many new farms it plans or their locations.
“We’re looking forward to continuing to provide consumers with access to local, high-quality produce and drive a more sustainable future,” said Brian Donato, senior vice president for operations at Bowery Farming.
Commissioning of the Bowery microgrid project is scheduled for the first quarter of 2019.
Microgrids explained
The market for microgrids is slowly but surely expanding, and the technology is generating a lot of buzz. But how exactly do microgrids work?
ABOUT BILL OPALKA
Bill Opalka is a freelance journalist based outside Albany, New York. He has written about energy for newspapers, magazines and other publications for more than 20 years.