30 August 2022

Alfen Partners with Ellevio to Deliver Sweden's Largest Grid-Scale Battery

Swedish energy company Ellevio is expanding its scope to help industries and businesses become fossil-free through electrification. Its first project - Sweden’s largest grid-scale battery – includes Alfen’s 10MW modular energy storage system TheBattery Elements™ which enables optimal use of renewable energy and stability in the power grid.

"Increasing renewables, decentralising energy and growing electricity consumption are creating challenges for the European power grid,” says Stephanie Schockaert, Sales Director for Alfen’s Energy Storage division. “Solutions like battery energy storage systems that are seamlessly integrated into the medium-voltage grid solve these problems for grid operators. With our Finnish subsidiary Alfen Elkamo, we’re proud to help build the power grid of the future using our fully integrated solutions. In this way we are supporting Ellevio as it works to achieve its goals, and we are contributing to those of its home country of Sweden."

Sweden is one of first countries in the world to adopt a net-zero emissions target, which it intends to achieve by 2045. At the same time, Sweden expects to more than double its electricity consumption over the next 25 years while using its main source of new electricity generation coming from wind power. Depending on how much wind there is, the amount of electricity fed into the grid will vary. If the balance is disturbed, there is a risk of disruptions in the electricity system that can be both costly and lead to dangerous grid outages.

Alfen's TheBattery Elements™ can help balance these disruptions. It is an industrial and modular energy storage system equipped with Fast Frequency Reserve (FFR) control technology that can handle the fluctuations (low inertia situations) in the Nordic grid using synthetic inertia. It requires very fast response times (<0.7s) which are also supported by Alfen’s in-house developed software platform. TheBattery system can also be used for other grid services and/or energy trading.

"For the energy transition to succeed, we need to ensure that the flow of electricity in the power grid is stable.” says Kristofer Fröjd, Senior Vice President, Strategy and Business Development at Ellevio AB. “We are achieving this stability by building Sweden's largest electricity grid battery, which will support state-owned Svenska Kraftnäts' needs to create balance in the national electricity grid. This is an important and exciting step in our journey to create energy solutions that help transform our energy system in Sweden."