OREANDA-NEWS. NEC Energy Solutions,  a subsidiary of NEC Corporation, today announced that it is supplying the Sterling Municipal Light Department (SMLD) of Sterling, MA with a 2 MW, 3.9MWh GSS® grid energy storage solution. Once complete in December of this year, it will be the largest battery-based energy storage system installed in New England and the first utility scale project in Massachusetts. It will improve grid resiliency against weather-related power outages, while providing enhanced clean energy usage and cost savings to the town of Sterling. Town, State and NEC ES officials commemorated the project today in an official groundbreaking ceremony.

To reduce Sterling's carbon footprint, SMLD has been installing large amounts of PV solar and is currently ranked seventh in the nation in installed PV per capita. However, SMLD desired greater resiliency and further modernization of its grid. The energy storage system will work in conjunction with the overall installed base of PV solar to provide the needed energy resiliency, particularly to critical town departments such as police, dispatch, and fire service. It will also provide transmission capacity charge savings from reducing peak demand, which will deliver energy cost saving benefits to the community. NEC ES is providing its turn-key GSS® energy storage solution which includes a single 53' container housing 3.9MWh of lithium ion batteries, a 2MW power conversion system, and proprietary NEC ES AEROS® controls software suite. NEC ES will also provide service and maintenance packages to SMLD for the GSS® energy storage installation.

The project was funded in part by a $1.46M grant from the Massachusetts Department of Energy Resources (DOER), under the leadership of Commissioner Judith Judson, with additional financial and technical assistance from the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Electricity (DOE-OE) under the direction of Dr. Imre Gyuk, and Sandia National Laboratories   (Sandia) under the leadership of Dan Borneo.  Additional technical support was provided by Clean Energy States Alliance (CESA) through its Energy Storage Technology Advancement Partnership (ESTAP), and by Clean Energy Group's Resilient Power Project through a generous grant from the Barr Foundation.

"Energy storage technologies, especially when paired with renewable energy, have the potential to be a game changer for Massachusetts, helping to lower the cost of energy to ratepayers while reducing emissions," said Massachusetts Department of Energy Resources Commissioner Judith Judson. "DOER's Community Clean Energy Resiliency Initiative, through which this project received funding, is a testament to the Baker-Polito Administration’s commitment to embracing innovative clean energy solutions across the Commonwealth."

"We’re pleased to have chosen NEC Energy Solutions for this project because they made energy storage easy," said Sean Hamilton, General Manager, Sterling Municipal Light Department. "Their expertise and knowledge, combined with years of global energy storage experience helped us achieve our combined goals of resiliency and cost savings using the right configuration and amount of energy storage to help strengthen and modernize our electricity system."