Unleashing Solar Energy Potential with Battery Storage
30 May 2023
Solar energy is an invaluable resource, increasingly adopted by businesses. Australia’s solar PV landscape has shown tremendous growth. As of December 2022, the country boasts more than 3.36 million solar PV installations, delivering a combined capacity exceeding 29.7 gigawatts. The medium-scale solar sector (comprising systems between 100kW and 5MW) alone added 117MW of new capacity in 2020, with total capacity reaching 521MW*.
This rapid expansion can be attributed to varied institutions such as shopping centres, farms, hospitals, light industry and commercial businesses, who have chosen solar to mitigate escalating electricity costs, augment their sustainability efforts and provide energy security.
However, many companies with solar photovoltaic (PV) installations are inadvertently giving away nearly 30% of their solar energy back to the grid at almost no gain.
Across 10 years, this could translate to a staggering loss of over $100,000 for a standard 100kW system or $1m for a 1MW system!
Lost value without a battery
Reclaimed value with a battery
How can businesses unlock the full potential of their solar investments? Here are three actionable strategies:
Daytime Utilisation of Solar Energy
An obvious yet effective way to optimise solar savings is to utilise the solar energy during daytime. This strategy significantly cuts down on the need to purchase grid electricity.
Investment in Battery Storage System
An effective battery storage system can retain your solar energy for subsequent use. This implies that your solar energy can be utilised during night-time or peak demand periods, thereby capitalising on periods when electricity rates surge.
Getting smart with our superEMS™
Once your system is up and running, use our portal to better understand your load profile and schedule the battery to dispatch during the most expensive hours of the day.
Energy Renaissance offers an integrated approach to address this concern with our Australian-made battery storage solutions. Our systems enable businesses to capture and exploit a larger share of their solar energy onsite, thereby maximising their solar investment returns, reducing dependence on grid electricity, and curbing financial losses associated with excess production export.
If you need help understanding your load profile and want to get better value from your solar investment, contact our customer service team. Just remember to have your energy bill handy.
Schedule a one-on-one consultation with Prateek Chourdia to explore how battery storage can boost returns on your solar investment.
Prateek is a renewable energy executive that brings a decade of experience from across the energy value chain and is passionate about helping customers solving problems.
* Source: Mid-scale solar PV modelling report, Green Energy Markets – July 2021. Australian PV Institute, PV in Australia” report for 2021.