Tapping the potential for energy storage in community energy initiatives

Driven by environmental concerns resulting from global warming, interest in renewable energy has grown in recent times. Similarly, improved efficiency and reliability in energy technologies have played a significant role in facilitating their adaptation at various scales. Of these technologies, ener...

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Main Authors: Kiamba, Lorna, Rodrigues, Lucélia Taranto, Marsh, Julian
Format: Conference or Workshop Item
Published: 2017
Subjects:
Online Access:https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/44789/
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author Kiamba, Lorna
Rodrigues, Lucélia Taranto
Marsh, Julian
author_facet Kiamba, Lorna
Rodrigues, Lucélia Taranto
Marsh, Julian
author_sort Kiamba, Lorna
building Nottingham Research Data Repository
collection Online Access
description Driven by environmental concerns resulting from global warming, interest in renewable energy has grown in recent times. Similarly, improved efficiency and reliability in energy technologies have played a significant role in facilitating their adaptation at various scales. Of these technologies, energy storage has been suggested to have potentially far-reaching benefits including: more effective utilisation of renewable sources, better integration into smart energy systems and the improvement of grid reliability. In a community energy setting, energy storage can be used to stow away energy generated during low demand periods. This energy can then be accessed by community members at a lower cost during periods when there is higher demand and when energy is more likely to be expensive to buy. In this paper, the authors review the potential benefits of integrating energy storage into community energy initiatives based on the experiences of a community energy company set up in the Meadows in Nottingham, UK. In addition, the barriers they experienced when trying to maximise on these benefits including inefficient government policy and regulations, high capital cost and a lack of replicable business models, are highlighted. The results from t this case study review indicate that the introduction of energy storage can facilitate the future-proofing of community energy infrastructure with increased community and grid efficiencies as well as improve community resilience to changes in energy provision, particularly with regard to finances and infrastructure.
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spelling nottingham-447892020-05-04T18:55:39Z https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/44789/ Tapping the potential for energy storage in community energy initiatives Kiamba, Lorna Rodrigues, Lucélia Taranto Marsh, Julian Driven by environmental concerns resulting from global warming, interest in renewable energy has grown in recent times. Similarly, improved efficiency and reliability in energy technologies have played a significant role in facilitating their adaptation at various scales. Of these technologies, energy storage has been suggested to have potentially far-reaching benefits including: more effective utilisation of renewable sources, better integration into smart energy systems and the improvement of grid reliability. In a community energy setting, energy storage can be used to stow away energy generated during low demand periods. This energy can then be accessed by community members at a lower cost during periods when there is higher demand and when energy is more likely to be expensive to buy. In this paper, the authors review the potential benefits of integrating energy storage into community energy initiatives based on the experiences of a community energy company set up in the Meadows in Nottingham, UK. In addition, the barriers they experienced when trying to maximise on these benefits including inefficient government policy and regulations, high capital cost and a lack of replicable business models, are highlighted. The results from t this case study review indicate that the introduction of energy storage can facilitate the future-proofing of community energy infrastructure with increased community and grid efficiencies as well as improve community resilience to changes in energy provision, particularly with regard to finances and infrastructure. 2017-07-17 Conference or Workshop Item PeerReviewed Kiamba, Lorna, Rodrigues, Lucélia Taranto and Marsh, Julian (2017) Tapping the potential for energy storage in community energy initiatives. In: 16th International Conference on Sustainable Energy Technologies (SET2017), 17-20 July 2017, Bologna, Italy. energy storage community energy renewable energy energy efficiency
spellingShingle energy storage
community energy
renewable energy
energy efficiency
Kiamba, Lorna
Rodrigues, Lucélia Taranto
Marsh, Julian
Tapping the potential for energy storage in community energy initiatives
title Tapping the potential for energy storage in community energy initiatives
title_full Tapping the potential for energy storage in community energy initiatives
title_fullStr Tapping the potential for energy storage in community energy initiatives
title_full_unstemmed Tapping the potential for energy storage in community energy initiatives
title_short Tapping the potential for energy storage in community energy initiatives
title_sort tapping the potential for energy storage in community energy initiatives
topic energy storage
community energy
renewable energy
energy efficiency
url https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/44789/