NYPA, EPRI awarded $200,000 to research long-duration storage

The New York Power Authority (NYPA) is launching a project with the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) to explore the use of crushed rock thermal energy storage to provide energy storage in a market with significant renewable energy resources.

The project, led by EPRI and funded by a $200,000 U.S. Department of Energy grant, will investigate the feasibility of a thermal energy storage (TES) technology developed by Brenmiller Energy. Another $50,000 will be funded by the project participants.

If determined to be feasible, the investigation team will pilot the technology and evaluate its ability to provide energy storage at NYPA’s Eugene W. Zeltmann Power Project in Astoria, N.Y.

Brenmiller, an Israeli developer and manufacturer of thermal energy storage systems, has patented a high-temperature crushed-rock TES system, which is being tested in three generations of demonstration units at separate sites globally.

The first phase of the project will be a feasibility study on the integration of the crushed-rock thermal energy storage into a range of fossil generation assets, which is expected to be complete in early 2022. 

A project plan would be developed for a second phase that would evaluate real world operating conditions and demonstrate the technology’s ability to provide effective and economical energy storage at a natural gas combined cycle plant.

The plan is to evaluate the cost and performance of Brenmiller’s TES technology, to support commercial-scale deployment by 2030.

As part of its Vision2030 strategic plan, NYPA is investigating the potential for low- to zero-carbon technologies at several of its facilities to help transition New York State from fossil fuel generation and stabilize the grid as it integrates cleaner sources of energy.

NYPA is also partnering with Brenmiller on a separate project to develop and demonstrate a TES-based combined heat and power (CHP) system at Purchase College (State University of New York) in Harrison, N.Y., to increase energy efficiency and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. That unit is expected to be operational later in the summer of 2021.

Additional information about Brenmiller is available here.