All charged up: Introducing ISO-NE’s new battery storage webpage

With increasing amounts of intermittent energy sources joining the region’s resource mix, the need to balance a more complex electricity grid has emerged. ISO New England’s new in-depth webpage, Batteries as Energy Storage in New England, is a primer on the role batteries play in an evolving power system.  

Offering efficient energy storage in modular packages, batteries can capture surplus electricity generated by wind, solar, and other resources. The stored electricity can be dispatched to the grid later to help keep electricity supply and demand in balance.

A look at the ISO Generator Interconnection Queue makes it plain that battery storage is growing in the region: battery projects made up about 20% of the proposed generating capacity in the queue as of May 2022, compared to 10% in July 2020—and less than 1% in May 2017. Battery projects are also competing in the Forward Capacity Market, with more than 700 MW of battery storage securing capacity supply obligations in the most recent Forward Capacity Auction, held in February 2022.

Changes to the resource mix and load patterns in New England will reveal further opportunities for energy storage and supply solutions to support the power system. What is certain is that these solutions, including batteries, are playing an important role in New England’s clean energy transition.