Vestas to integrate energy storage with wind power
With renewable energy generation now cost-competitive with electricity produced from fossil fuels, significant challenges remain in how to integrate renewable energy into power grids and systems, as renewables cannot always match supply with demand.
Sustainable energy company, Vestas, and battery-manufacturer, Northvolt, announced a technology collaboration on the development of a lithium-ion battery platform for Vestas power plants. As an initial phase of the partnership, Vestas is investing 10 million EUR.
The solution to solving this challenge is storing renewably-generated electricity so it can be provided when needed. Battery storage is a key technology to support the large-scale integration of renewable energy into energy systems and to speed up the transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy.
In this context, providers of both wind energy technologies and battery technologies are looking for ways to accelerate this integration.
With the support of Northvolt, Vestas is looking to bring the most competitive and sustainable hybrid storage solutions to the market and to better integrate storage and renewable energy generation technologies as a means to meet broader industry challenges and increase the uptake of more renewables.
This is being done both through existing research and development and by combining it with unique competencies and experiences of new partners. In this way, Northvolt will become a part of Vestas’ hybrid supplier ecosystem.
Northvolt, with the support of Vestas, is looking to better understand the needs of the renewable energy sector in order to develop batteries for solution providers and OEMs. Northvolt is building a next-generation battery factory with the aim to produce the world’s greenest batteries to enable and accelerate the transition to renewable energy.
“This important collaboration with Northvolt will enable Vestas to define, challenge and improve battery storage offering for customers that need hybrid and storage solutions,” says Vestas’ Chief Technology Officer Anders Vedel. “There is a strong shared purpose and strategic fit with Northvolt that will support our goal to expand our knowledge in an area that we know will only grow in importance to the renewables and overall electricity market.”
