Long-duration storage could be key to reliability

A new report has found that long-duration energy storage (LDES) could play a critical role in maintaining Australia’s energy reliability as coal plants retire over the next decade.

Currently, there is plenty of short (2-hour) and medium (4-hour) storage being built across the nation, but uptake of long-duration storage has been slower due to a lack of policy support and market incentives.

Now that there are clear mechanisms in place helping to attract short-duration storage projects, developers are urging policymakers to shift their attention to long-duration storage, which can deliver electricity to the grid for 8+ hours.

The report, by Endgame Economics, was commissioned by a group of LDES developers including Canadian company Hydrostor, which has Australian offices in Melbourne and Adelaide. It found that a portfolio of storage across different durations is essential to provide resilience, system benefits and lower cost compared to portfolios composed of only shorter-duration storages.

Endgame Economics calculated the long-run marginal cost (LRMC) across four different scenarios from 2035–40, finding that a mixed portfolio of storage options was 38% cheaper than alternatives, at $90/MWh, compared to $145/MWh for a system reliant on 2-hour storage.

“Policymakers across the country have done an excellent job of attracting intermittent renewables and short-duration storage projects into our energy system, making Australia a world leader in solar and lithium battery storage,” said Martin Becker, Senior Vice-President – Origination & Development (Australia) at Hydrostor.

“Now, focus needs to shift to the next frontier of the energy transition: long-duration storage. This report demonstrates the clear need for long-duration storage to keep costs down for households and businesses.”

Becker said that coal-fired power stations still account for a significant proportion of the nation’s energy generation, doing most of the heavy lifting overnight. “Long-duration storage offers an emission-free, like-for-like replacement that can play the same role at far lower cost than lithium BESS,” he said.

“Without investing in these types of projects today, there will be limited availability of deeper and cheaper storage to deliver reliable, affordable energy post 2030.”

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