Aiming to contribute to a faster energy transition by enabling a greener and more resilient energy supply in rural areas, the Resilience as a Service (RaaS)-project has been started.
It brings together strong project partners: E.ON Innovation and the B2B solutions departments of E.ON – one of Europe’s largest DSOs (Distribution System Operator) – will collaborate with Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks (SSEN) and Costain Group PLC. SSEN is one of two energy companies in the United Kingdom that operate both in electricity transmission and electricity distribution. Today, E.ON, SSEN, and Costain is announcing this significant collaboration.
New market solution
During the course of the RaaS-project, the partners will create a new market solution
During the course of the RaaS-project, the partners will create a new market solution for grid resilience by leveraging the strength of technical solutions such as battery storage in combination with access to different flexibility markets.
The core of this innovative energy system will be a battery energy storage system that can reestablish the supply of a village in case of an outage and leverage local renewable energy assets to provide power until the DNO (Distribution Network Operator) can correct the problem.
By developing this innovative energy solution, which combines energy storage, local renewables, smart grid controls, flexibility services, and new commercial models, RaaS will enhance grid stability and improve security of supply, therefore contributing to a faster and more affordable energy transition in remote locations throughout Europe.
Sustainability, reliability, and resilience
“For us at E.ON and for our customers, sustainability, reliability, and resilience are not conflicting but complementary aspects of the future energy system.”
“With the Resilience as a Service-project, we will demonstrate not only how resilience and reliability can be improved at a lower cost for our customers, but also how this can be done in a carbon-neutral way by applying new technologies and smart controls.”
“We are looking forward to this collaboration with SSEN and Costain, and the opportunity to contribute to another small but important step toward a sustainable and CO2-free future,” states Paul French, Director B2B Solution Sales UK.
Renewable generation and electrification
In the coming years, power systems in Europe are set to change dramatically
In the coming years, power systems in Europe are set to change dramatically under the drivers of distributed renewable generation and electrification of mobility and heating.
This will require a significant amount of investment in grid infrastructure in order to maintain reliable power supply. Remote areas, such as islands and rural regions, may be impacted as technical and physical barriers will make upgrading legacy systems challenging and not economical. For example, in the UK, many rural areas are supplied by a single electric line, which can result in an above-average number of outages.
Bridging the gap
In the RaaS-project, E.ON, SSEN, and Costain will collaborate to bridge this gap by developing a solution that provides both resilience and grid stability services to network operators at an affordable price and high value for the local communities, which can benefit from reliable and more affordable clean power.
“To achieve a faster and more affordable energy transformation across Europe, we need more forward-thinking collaborations and exchange of key expertise. For instance, in Simris, Sweden, we installed an innovative energy system, which can run on up to 100 percent locally produced renewables.”
“Through that, we generated the necessary know-how to understand how battery systems and community solutions can achieve a faster and cheaper energy transition. We apply this knowledge in RaaS to support SSEN in enabling their customers to benefit from their current and future locally installed renewable plants,” states Luis Hernandez, Head of Innovation, Energy Communities and Networks at E.ON Innovation.
The collaboration
The collaboration in this project will span four years. Until mid-2021, E.ON, SSEN, and Costain will focus on the technical and commercial development of this new solution.
From 2021 on, the partners will focus on building and operating a pilot project. The first demo-site will be installed in a remote location in Scotland, showcasing the solution and providing learnings. Starting in 2022, scaling to other sites is planned.