Vattenfall has confirmed it is to press ahead with a 22MW battery storage scheme at the largest onshore windfarm in Wales.
The battery@pyc system will provide a rapid-reaction reliability service to the national grid and be based at the Swedish company’s 228MW Pen Y Cymoedd windfarm.
Preliminary site investigations will start either next month (June) or July and once complete, construction work is expected to start in August and be finished by Christmas.
Operations at the battery facility are scheduled to start in February 2018.
Vattenfall’s head of business area wind, Gunnar Groebler, said the scheme is the company’s biggest battery project to date.
“We have ambitions for more batteries at our windfarm sites across Europe and so I hope that battery@pyc will herald more storage facilities in the UK,” said Groebler.
Earlier this month, Vattenfall announced the Pen y Cymoedd windfarm had started operating at full power.
“Battery@pyc can respond to power fluctuations on the grid within a second, by pumping in power if frequency drops, or drawing in, if too high,” said project manager, Frank Elsworth.
“These reliability services have been provided for decades, but not this smartly, so we think battery@pyc is the kind of affordable solution that will help power smarter living in the UK.”