MBS makes a visit to full working trials of am energy storage solution
Modern Building Services (MBS), along with an additional 50 invited guests attended an event to showcase the potential of the pioneering EnergiVault® energy storage solution, which is designed to support the global decarbonisation of cooling and deliver cost savings for industrial processes and commercial buildings.
The patented cold thermal energy storage (CTES) system from Lancashire-based Organic Heat Exchangers (O-Hx) is undergoing full working trials at the Alnwick site of Quotient Sciences, a drug development and manufacturing accelerator, and has already delivered significant benefits and savings after being installed alongside an existing chilled water system.
The charger’s ice crystallisers charge the battery by converting up to 60% of the system’s heat transfer fluid (HTF), a water/glycol mix, into spherical ice crystals a fraction of a millimetre in diameter, each surrounded by a film of organic material. This ice slurry acts as the phase change material (PCM), resulting in a massive increase of the surface area over which the thermal transfer takes place. The thermal battery has very high discharge rates, unlike solid ice technologies, and unlimited charge-discharge cycles with zero battery degradation.
In addition to accessing electricity at its cheapest, the optimisation engine also enables the system to take advantage of periods of low carbon intensity on the grid, when more of the power is produced from renewable sources, resulting in reduced impact on the environment.
Operating data from the trial reveals that EnergiVault® will handle 30% of the Quotient Sciences site's 500MWh per year cooling demand at a basic level of operation, utilising ToU shifting to avoid high electrical tariffs. This has resulted in a 27% cost saving to date through load shifting and chiller efficiency benefits. When operating at its full potential, O-Hx calculates that savings significantly in excess of this will be available for the majority of sites, with potential for more than 60% saving against site cooling costs and reduction of CO₂ emissions.
MBS, along with the other invited guests were able to examine the installed system, with live dashboard feeds demonstrating charge and discharge rates, energy consumption and further key data sets. They were also challenged to test the cooling capabilities of the ice slurry.
