See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.

net/publication/320100901

Compressed Air Energy Storage: a new beginning?

Conference Paper · September 2017

CITATIONS READS

3 359

2 authors, including:

Arnaud Réveillère
GEOSTOCK
29 PUBLICATIONS   168 CITATIONS   

SEE PROFILE

Some of the authors of this publication are also working on these related projects:

Past accidents in salt caverns - SMRI project View project

ANR FluidStory View project

All content following this page was uploaded by Arnaud Réveillère on 29 September 2017.

The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file.

SOLUTION MINING RESEARCH INSTITUTE Technical
www.solutionmining.org Conference
Paper
105 Apple Valley Circle
Clarks Summit, PA 18411, USA

Telephone: +1 570-585-8092

Compressed Air Energy Storage: a new beginning?

Arnaud Réveillère and Louis Londe,

Geostock, France

SMRI Fall 2017 Technical Conference

25 - 26 September 2017
Münster, Germany

1
 Solution Mining Research Institute Fall 2017 Technical Conference
Münster, Germany, 25 - 26 September 2017

Compressed Air Energy Storage: a new beginning?

Arnaud Réveillère and Louis Londe

Geostock, 2 Rue des Martinets, 92500 Rueil-Malmaison, France

Abstract
Ambitious targets for renewable penetration in the electricity production mix go with the emergence of
new challenges, such as the integration of intermittent electricity into the transmission and distribution grid
and the need for storage or power production backups. Different technologies exist and are both compet-
ing and complementary to cover the demand. Compressed air energy storage (CAES) systems is one of
the rare technologies able to store high amounts of energy. CAES in salt caverns does exist at industrial
scale since the Huntorf (Germany) and McIntosh (Alabama, USA) plants came into operation in 1978 and
1991, respectively. To date, no industrial project has emerge for more than 25 years. However, an in-
creasing number of utilities are now considering CAES to address the power storage market. One of the
underlying reasons for this new interest is that isothermal CAES, despite the absence of thermal energy
storage which limits its efficiency below 50%, turns out to be well suited to the main revenue mechanism
currently targeted by project developers: getting money from grid operators for commitment to provide
electricity, without necessarily providing it (capacity markets). The present work will review historical
CAES developments, expose recent ones and introduce to some of the reasons under this new begin-
ning.

Key words: Compressed Air Energy Storage (CAES), Adiabatic Compressed Air Energy Storage (A-
CAES)

1. Introduction

1.1. Need for electricity storage

The balance between the supply and demand of electricity, necessary for the proper functioning of
electrical grids, is becoming increasingly fragile. The increased use of intermittent renewable energy
sources, mainly wind, are creating additional sources of fragility. Weather hazards cause fluctuations
in production, which are independent of consumption. New types of situations have to be handled:
overproduction of electricity during off-peak hours, and means of production which cannot be relied
upon during peak periods. The increased volatility in the price of electricity is one indicator of these
tensions. In France, on the 8th of February 2012, a peak of 102 GW in consumption brought the market
price up to 2000€/MWh. In contrast, in 2010 Germany experienced periods of negative pricing as low
as -500 €/MWh, caused by a surplus in wind turbine production (Enea, 2012).

Faced with these tensions, different solutions can be implemented: the use of peaking power plant, a
better interconnection of the electrical grid, management of the demand, and energy storage. More
than 100 GW of electricity storage exist today globally, 99% of which is currently done by Pumped-
storage hydroelectricity (PSH). But development of additional PSH capacity is constrained by local
opposition and limited suitable areas. With a 290 MW and a 110 MW plant currently operating since

2
1978 and 1991, respectively, Compressed Air Energy Storage is one of the largest among other tech-
niques currently used for storing large quantities of electricity.

1.2. Isothermal Compressed Air Energy Storage (CAES) and Adiabatic Compressed Air En-
ergy Storage (A-CAES)

Compression of air creates heat; the air is warmer after compression. Expansion removes heat. If no
extra heat is added, the air will be much colder after expansion. If the heat generated during compres-
sion can be stored and used during expansion, the efficiency of the storage improves considera-
bly. There are two main ways in which a CAES system can deal with the heat:

 Adiabatic Compressed Air Energy Storage (A-CAES)

During storage, Adiabatic Compressed Air Energy Storage (A-CAES) stores the heat produced by com-
pression and uses it for warming up the pressurized air prior to going through the expander during
unloading.

The theoretical efficiency of adiabatic storage approaches 100% with perfect insulation, but in practice
round trip efficiency is expected to be 70%. Heat can be stored in a solid such as concrete or stone, or
more likely in a fluid such as hot oil (up to 300 °C) or molten salt solutions (600 °C).

Fig. 1: Adiabatic CAES principle

 Non-adiabatic or Isothermal Compressed Air Energy Storage (I-CAES)

In the present paper, “Isothermal Compressed Air Energy Storage (I-CAES)”, refers to the case also
called “non-adiabatic” or “Diabatic” CAES, in which much of the compression heat is dissipated with in-
tercoolers (thus approaching isothermal compression) into the atmosphere as waste; essentially wast-
ing, thereby, the energy used to perform the work of compression.

Upon unloading from storage, the pressure of this compressed air is one indicator of the amount of
stored energy that remains in this air, which actually a potential mechanical work. Temperature is an-
other. To be able to perform this work, the air must be re-heated prior to expansion in the turbine to
power a generator. This reheating is typically accomplished by using a natural gas fired burner.

According to Schainker, 2011, a “Standard” I-CAES plant requires 0.7 kWh of electricity and 1.1 kWh
(3800 Btu) of high heating value (HHV) of gas for each kWh of energy output, corresponding to an
energy recovery efficiency of about 55%.

3
 Fig. 2: Isothermal CAES principle

The present article will expose main historical developments (Section 2), review recent projects (Sec-
tion 3) and conduct a business case on a typical CAES project to provide some insights to the recent
developments (section 4).

2. Historical developments

2.1. Huntorf, Germany

The Huntorf plant is located in North Germany, and was commissioned in 1978 as the world's first
CAES plant. Its main characteristics according to Crotogino et al. (2001) are the following:

Cavern characteristics
 Caverns depth (casing shoe) ~645 m / GL (~2100 ft/GL)
 Caverns geometric volume (in 2 caverns) 310 000 m3 (2 Mbbl)
 caverns pressure range 43 – 70 bar (620 – 1000 psi)
Power system
 Expander output power delivered to the grid 290 MW
 Compressor power 60 MW
 Unloading duration 4h
 Ramp-up time 10 min

4
Fig. 3: Left: Schematic layout of the Huntorf plant. From Brown Boveri & Cie. Right: the 2 cav-
erns and the plant at the same scale from Crotogino et al., 2001

The cycle efficiency of the plant is reported at about 42%.

2.2. McIntosh
In 1991, a 110 MW plant was constructed in McIntosh, AL, USA, and improved upon the Huntorf design
by incorporating a recuperator (air-to-air heat exchanger) to preheat air from the cavern using exhaust
heat from the turbines.

Fig. 4: Schematic layout of the McIntosh CAES plant, including the heat recuperator

5
Its main characteristics are the following (based on Goodson, J.O., 1992 and Pollak, R., 1994):

Cavern characteristics
 Cavern depth (casing shoe) 442 m / GL (1450 ft / GL)
 Cavern geometric volume (in 2 caverns) 580 000 m3 (3.6 Mbbl)
 cavern pressure range 45 – 74 bar (650 – 1000 psi)
Power system
 Expander output power delivered to the grid 110 MW
 Compressor power 49 MW
 Unloading duration 26 h
 Ramp-up time 15 min

Thanks to the heat recuperator, the fuel consumption is reduced by 22% to 25% and the cycle efficiency
reaches 54%.

2.3. Other large scale projects

Several other large scale projects were developed. Among others, a feasibility study of a 300 MW plant
in 2 caverns at 545 and 880 m/GL was conducted in 1993 in Israel.

3. (Selected) recent projects

The number of project that have recently been under development tends to show a renewed interest in
CAES technologies. The figure and list below briefly presents a selection of the projects since 2010.
Geostock has been involved in more than half of these projects.

Fig. 5: Indicative schedule of selected CAES projects after 2010

 SACRE: French research project studying the technical and economic feasibility of adiabatic
compressed air energy storage in salt (feasibility studies done for several French locations)
and mined caverns. It included heat storage in ceramics1;
 SEARCH: French research project focused on Advanced Adiabatic CAES, including the study
of lined mined caverns and thermal energy storage pilots in rocks or ceramics (built and visible
in Grenoble, France)2;

1
http://www.agence-nationale-recherche.fr/?Project=ANR-10-STKE-0006. Visited on 29/08/2017
2
http://www.agence-nationale-recherche.fr/Colloques/Energies2012/presentations/Search.pdf Visited on
29/08/2017 The Thermal energy storage pilots can still be visited at CEA Liten in Grenoble, as the authors did
in 2017.

6
  RICAS 2020: European research project aiming at evaluating performances and feasibility of
Advanced Adiabatic Compressed Air Energy Storage (AA-CAES)3;
 DEMETAIR. Concept of small volume adiabatic CAES in the lined base of a shaft;
 SUSTAIN-X: Concept of small volume isothermal CAES in a lined mined cavern or well. The
compression and expansion are to be done through a mechanical crankshat drive train (motor)
and the heat is extracted using a foam;
 NYSEG Seneca. Project of 130 to 180 MW I-CAES near Seneca lake, NY, USA4
 Petit-Couronne: Study of the conversion of a mined cavern having stored LPG into adiabatic
CAES in France (Réveillère and Cracowski, 2016);
 NRStor: Adiabatic CAES projects in Ontario, Canada 5;
 MAGNUM CAES: Project of a 160 MW isothermal CAES plant in Utah, USA6;
 ADELE Adiabatic CAES. Project of up to 200 MW A-CAES in Germany7;
 Storelectric: Project of either a conversion of existing gas-fired CCGT into I-CAES, or to A-
CAES using a thermal energy storage in UK8;
 APEX Bethel Energy Center: Project of a 317 MW isothermal CAES facility in Texas, USA9;
 GAELECTRIC. Projects of a 330 MW isothermal CAES in Larne (Northern Ireland, UK) and
addtional projects in UK and Netherlands 10; and
 ALACAES: In 2016, started a pilot Adiabatic CAES in an abandonned tunnel of the Swiss Alps.
Target a 72% round trip efficiency. The patented Thermal Energy Storage is made using rocks
within the tunnel11.

4. Business case

4.1. Various possible sources of revenue

Electricity storage has the flexibility to operate in several ways: within energy market, by trading energy
to gain from arbitrage, and in ancillary markets, offering reserve, power quality and reliability services.
It can also be integrated with existing infrastructure: generators such as wind farms (to reduce balanc-
ing costs, time-shift delivery or manage constraints); demand centers (to reduce network service
charges); or networks (deferring costly upgrades to transmission and distribution systems).

These various possible services are usually offered to the grid operator, or the company that has the
responsibility to balance production and demand. The revenues that can be obtained from offering
these services are very regulation-dependent, and therefore very country-specific. It is not the purpose
of the present article to review these many local markets in detail.

However, the revenues gained from providing one of these many services should come from one of
the following two revenue sources:
 The Capacity markets. The storage operator contracts “available power” with the grid operator
(or equivalent): during certain time slots, it has to be able to produce power (in MW), under a
specified ramp-up time, without necessarily doing it.
 The Energy markets. The storage operator sells the energy unloaded from the storage, and
is paid for the energy (in MWh) provided to the network.

3
www.ricas2020.eu . Visited on 29/08/2017
4
https://www.smartgrid.gov/files/NETL-Final-Report-9-6-12.pdf. Visited on 29/08/2017
5
http://www.nrstor.com/news/ieso-selects-nrstor-to-deliver-fuel-free-compressed-air-energy-storage-capacity-
services/ Visited on 29/08/2017
6
http://www.westernenergyhub.com . Visited on 29/08/2017
7
https://www.rwe.com/web/cms/mediablob/en/391748/data/364260/1/rwe-power-ag/innovations/Brochure-
ADELE.pdf Visited on 29/08/2017
8
http://storelectric.com/how-caes-works.html . Visited on 29/08/2017
9
http://www.apexcaes.com/project Visited on 29/08/2017
10
http://www.gaelectric.ie/energy-storage-projects/project-caes-larne-ni/ Visited on 29/08/2017
11
https://alacaes.com/technology/pilot-plant/ Visited on 29/08/2017. Site visit may by possible, as did by the
authors in 2016

7
 4.2. Number of days in operation
The fact that the storage operator does not necessarily have to produce electricity implies that it does
not necessarily have to operate every day. The number of operation per year may also vary over the
years, which is for instance the case of the Huntorf plant: while it was used nearly on a daily basis
during its first 2 years, it is only used about 50 to 60 times a year after 1995 (cf. below).

Fig. 6: Cycles per year at Huntorf plant. From Crotogino et al. (2001)

This evolution in number of cycles per year may be related to an evolution in the service offered by the
plant, as described as follows in 2001: “The power station is typically used today as a minute reserve:
medium load power stations (coal) take 3 – 4 hours to generate full capacity before they can provide
short-term power – the intervening time is preferentially covered by CAES plant,” (Crotogino et al.,
2001).

This example shows that the service the plant delivers can influence on the number of cycles per year.
More generally, it illustrates the fact that the number of cycles per year and the service a storage plant
targets can influence the technological choice of the CAES solution (adiabatic or not). In the following,
we will test this assumption on a Business Case applied to both A-CAES and I-CAES for two different
cycles:
 350 cycles per year case
 50 cycles per year case

8
 4.3. Cost structure of Isothermal and Adiabatic CAES

The main characteristics of the typical plant we consider are the following.

Cavern characteristics
 Cavern depth (casing shoe) 1000 m (3281 ft)
 Cavern geometric volume 400 000 m3 (2.5 Mbbl)
 Operation pressure difference 20 bar (290 psi)
Power system
 Expander output power delivered to the grid 250 MW
 Compressor power 100 MW
 Unloading duration 4h
Economic hypotheses
 Natural gas (CAES case only) 18 €/MWh (5.2 €/MMBtu)
 Inflation for O&M and fuel 3% per year
 Discount rate 7%

The CAPEX of such “typical” storage plant are estimated to 215 M€ for the Adiabatic-CAES and 136 M€
for the (non-adiabatic) CAES. Costs breakdown are presented below.

Adiabatic-CAES CAPEX split Isothermal CAES CAPEX split

Leaching and drilling

Leaching and drilling
Leaching plant
Leaching plant
Compressor & expander
Compressor & expander
Other equipments
Other equipments
Thermal energy storage
Contigency
Contigency

Fig. 7: Cost breakdown in net present value

9
 4.4. (Simple) revenue models of both plants

A detailed business case would require a detailed market analysis which is not the focus of the present
article. In the following, the business case of a 100 MW CAES plant in Western Germany from BCG
2011 is extrapolated.

Fig. 8: Summary of BCG (2011) business case to provide the various revenue sources

From this business case, we most notably retain the following elements:
- 76% of the revenues come from the capacity market, 24% from the energy market
- 15% of profit for the base case (Adiabatic CAES operating 350 days per year) in Net present value.

Using these assumptions for the revenues and the costs exposed in the previous Section 4.3., we find
that when operating 350 days per year, the Adiabatic CAES total present value is positive (+44 M €),
whereas the isothermal CAES is not (-129 M€).

10
 Fig. 9: Revenues and costs net present value (M€) for A-CAES or I-CAES plants operating
350 cycles per year

On the opposite, when operating 50 cycles per year, the Adiabatic CAES total present value is negative
(-29 M€), whereas the Isothermal CAES is not (+51 M€).

Fig. 10: Revenues and costs net present value (M€) for A-CAES or I-CAES plants operating
50 cycles per year

11
 In these conditions, the isothermal CAES, that does not have to bear the investment of the Thermal
Energy Storage, is more competitive when considering a limited number of operations per year (50).
On the contrary, for a nearly daily use of the storage, the fuel consumption during unloading induces
an increased fuel cost that make the Adiabatic CAES more interesting.

5. Conclusion

Number of projects of both Adiabatic and Non-adiabatic CAES have been burgeoning over the past
few years. While the research or pilot (<10 MW power output) projects are mostly targeting adiabatic
CAES, the industrial projects (>100 MW) are mostly considering non-adiabatic storage, similar to the
two historical examples of Huntorf and McIntosh.

A simple business case of a “typical” plant suggests that one explanation lies in the revenue sources
and the cost structure of both techniques. Revenues for storage can come from the capacity market
(commitment to be able to put electricity on the grid, without necessarily doing it) or the energy market
(producing electricity). Market conditions are very country-specific, but tend to offer the largest share
of revenue through the capacity market.

This case illustrates the fact that while Adiabatic-CAES is seducing from an engineering point of view
(70% energetic efficiency), the Non-adiabatic (or isothermal) CAES may be better suited to the current
market conditions, in which revenue sources are mostly coming for the Capacity market, the commit-
ment to provide energy without necessarily doing it. The non-adiabatic CAES also benefits from being
relatively simple, made from relatively standard equipment (an electric compressor, a -slightly specific-
gas expander and a –slightly specific- salt cavern), which secures its feasibility and minimizes the initial
investment. It moreover benefits from historically low prices of natural gas.

6. Acknowledgments
Part of this work has been funded by the French National Research Agency (ANR) as part of the Flu-
idStory project, focused on an alternative storage technique: the EMO (Electrolysis – Methanation –
Oxycombustion). CAES is used a comparison point.

7. References

BCG, 2011. Revisiting Energy Storage. There Is a Business Case. https://www.bcg.com/docu-

ments/file72092.pdf

Brown Boveri & Cie (BBC). "Huntorf air storage gas turbine power plant." Energy Supply, Publication#
D GK 90202.

Crotogino, F., Mohmeyer, K.-U., Scharf, R., 2001. Huntorf CAES: More than 20 years of successful
operation. Proceeding of the SMRI Spring 2001 Meeting, Orlando, Florida, USA.

Enea consulting, 2012. Energy Storage. Issues, technical solutions and development opportunities.
March 2012.

Goodson, J.O., 1992. History of First U.S. Compressed Air energy Storage (CAES) Plant (110 MW –
26h) – volume 1: Early CAES Development. EPRI Report TR-101751.

Pollak, R., 1994. History of First U.S. Compressed Air energy Storage (CAES) Plant (110 MW – 26h)
– volume 2: Construction. EPRI Report TR-101751v2

Réveillère, A., Cracowski, P., 2016. Réhabilitation de cavités minées de Petit-Couronne en stockage
d’énergie renouvelable. Technical Sessions of CFMR/CFGI, Paris, 03/11/2016 (in French)

Schainker, R.B., 2011. Advanced Compressed Air Energy Storage (CAES) Demonstration Projects.
Proceeding from EPRI Renewable Energy Council, April 6, 2011.

Note: revised version on 11/09/2017 for minor changes. Most notably, a mistake in the McInstosh table in §2.2.

12

View publication stats