The Renault Group has announced plans to create the largest energy stationary storage system using automotive electric vehicle batteries found in Europe by 2020. With a capacity of “at least 60 MWh”, the ‘Advanced Battery Storage’ sites will be gradually expanded to contain the energy of 2,000 EV battery packs. Three facilities will be developed in 2019 in France and Germany, at Renault plants in Douai, Cléon and North Rhine-Westphalia.
USED RENAULT EV BATTERIES TO CREATE ENERGY STORAGE FACILITIES
60 MWh is around the daily consumption of a city of 5,000 households, and the purpose of the sites are to balance discrepancies between energy consumption and production. The storage system is built using second-life EV batteries compiled in containers with the capacity to “generate or absorb, instantaneously the 70MW power”. The Renault Group is particularly well placed to develop systems using second-life battery packs, because of the way it marketed electric vehicles while often retaining ownership of the battery packs that were leased to customers.
Advanced Battery Storage will form part of the Renault Group’s strategy to develop what it calls a ‘smart electric eco-system’. Its vision is that electric vehicles plugged in overnight will intelligently charge when supply exceeds demand and renewable production peaks, stop charging if the grid is under stress and even put power back into the grid during consumption peaks.
