Volkswagen's first green energy storage system in northern Germany in 2025
VW says "power centers" from used e-car batteries will stabilize the grid from 2025.
Electric car battery after removal
(Image: Shutterstock / Roman Zaiets)
Volkswagen announces a new business model with its battery storage systems to stabilize the power grid. Next year, the charging power division "Elli" will go online with its first so-called "Power Center". The location of the green interim storage facility is planned for northern Germany, with construction due to start in the next six to eight weeks. According to Volkswagen, the facility should be connected to the grid by early 2025.
To make this worthwhile for the charging network division, the energy storage systems will also be used for arbitrage transactions on the electricity trading market. An initial capacity of 700 MWh is planned, which can be expanded to one gigawatt hour. Volkswagen Group Board Member for Technology Thomas Schmall sees a rapidly growing demand: "Germany and Europe need sufficient storage solutions to cover the increasing demand and to balance out the volatile feed-in of renewable energies. Our investments in stationary battery storage systems are therefore a key contribution to the sustainable transformation of the energy supply."
Indispensable for the energy transition
Elli writes: "In 2023 alone, around 10,500 GWh of electricity from renewable sources was not generated in Germany due to a lack of options for intermediate storage. This amount of electricity would have been enough to power more than 3.2 million electric vehicles with green electricity for a year. To compensate for the volatility of renewable energies, the Fraunhofer Institute expects a need for more than 100 GWh of battery storage by 2030. The more balancing power is available for grid stabilization from emission-free large-scale storage systems, the fewer gas-fired power plants are needed, which only need to be kept in reserve for peak loads.
Worthwhile secondary use before recycling
Electric car batteries that no longer meet vehicle performance standards are too valuable to recycle immediately due to the significant energy invested in their production. Their remaining capacity can be effectively utilized in large-scale storage systems, where their sheer volume compensates for any performance loss. Volkswagen envisions this as an interim use for the batteries before they have to be recycled. The Group can also earn money with the old batteries through electricity trading.
Although there are not yet enough returns from electric cars, which according to Volkswagen means that the first storage facility will be equipped with new material, there should soon be enough material available for a continuous flow. Control units, which monitor the batteries down to cell level, charge and discharge the batteries depending on the remaining capacity and report when the units are finally used up. In Kassel, Volkswagen has set up a large storage facility with used batteries from the VW E-Up small electric car (endurance test), which is already being used to test electricity trading.
(fpi)