Business model for Asuncion energy storage

The business models for large energy storage systems like PHS and CAES are changing. Their role is tradition-ally to support the energy system, where large amounts of baseload capacity cannot deliver enough flexibility to respond to changes in demand during the day.

Building upon both strands of work, we propose to characterize business models of energy storage as the combination of an application of storage with the revenue stream earned from the operation and the market role of the investor.

E Though the business models are not yet fully developed, the cases indicate some initial trends for energy storage technology. Energy storage is becoming an independent asset class in the energy system; it is neither part of transmission and distribution, nor generation. We see four key lessons emerging from the cases.

With the rise of intermittent renewables, energy storage is needed to maintain balance between demand and supply. With a changing role for storage in the ener-gy system, new business opportunities for energy stor-age will arise and players are preparing to seize these new business opportunities.

Energy storage has the potential to disrupt business models. Energy storage has been around for a long time. Ales-sandro Volta invented the battery in 1800. Even earlier, in 1749, Benjamin Franklin had conducted the first ex-periments. And the first pumped hydro storage facili-ties (PHS) were built in Italy and Switzerland in 1890.

Energy storage technologies compete with other solu-tions to deliver or absorb power when needed. Existing solutions, like grid expansion or more interconnections, the establishment of a capacity market for gas-fired pow-er plants or strategic reserves, still receive a great deal of attention from policy makers, regulators and system op-erators.