RenewEconomy

Panasonic has agreed on trials with Red Energy, the retailing arm of the mostly New South Wales state government-owned Snowy Hydro, along with Queensland regional network operator and retailer Ergon Energy, and the ACT-based utility ActewAGL.

The Japanese company says the 8kWh lithium-ion battery storage system, with an output of 2kW, has been designed specifically for the Australian market. It says it will best suit solar arrays of around 5kW.

Panasonic says the system will help solar households double their rates of self consumption from around 30 per cent to 60 per cent, by storing excess solar output during the day for use later. This, it says, will provide "a reliable, efficient base load for solar installed households during peak periods."

Panasonic is one of a number of international and local battery technology developers targeting Australia, which, because of its high electricity prices, great solar resource and its world-leading penetration levels of household solar, is considered one of the most prospective markets in the world.

Katsufumi Miyamoto, the head of strategic planning for energy systems at Panasonic, told RenewEconomy in an interview that Australia will lead the world in battery storage, and the development of new business models for retailers and network operators.

Apart from a backup storage system designed for the Japanese market, Australia will be the first international market that it will tackle.

But Panasonics approach is different to others. While most battery storage developers are targeting individual households and will sell direct to consumers, Panasonic is looking to sell only through retailers and network operators.

Thats the intent of the trials with Ergon, ActewAGL and Red Energy. The trials will last two years, but Panasonic expects data to provide enough information within two months. It will begin its sales channel by October and all utilities involved say they expect to sell to their customers at that time.

Paul Reid, the managing director of Panasonic Australia, says the system will include demand response technology and remote charge and discharge programs which can be used by retailers and network operators.

For instance, the use of a utilitys server could aggregate up to 20,000 individual solar systems, or provide a total of 40MW capacity to deal with loads at peak time. There is potential for them to access large volumes of energy at any particular time, Reid says.

Reid says the key to battery technology will be its ability to deliver value, not just to consumers, but to retailers and networks as well.

The consumer is central to this, but if we can deliver a win, win, win situation  a win to the consumer, a win to the network, and a win to the retailer, this will be a different proposition to other off the shelf products, he said.