Young Energy Professionals: Energy storage

Speaker abstracts and biographies

Chair: Mark Kealy, Energy Analyst, Department of Innovation, Industry and Regional Development
 

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Strategies for using energy storage in Australia’s electricity system
The interesting thing about energy storage is that nobody is quite sure how to use it.  A variety of storage technologies are now available at large scale and their performance, reliability, longevity, and supply chains are improving steadily.  There are several outstanding applications to which energy storage is presently being applied on electricity networks.  There are visionary implications of energy storage when it is widely available on a national or potentially an international scale.  Yet the owner of a storage facility might well be feeling that he or she is missing out on something.  This is correct. 

Few energy storage applications generate sufficient income, or deferral of expenditure, to justify the initial investment – rather, it is in serving multiple applications that energy storage is likely to find it’s true strength.  Depending on the jurisdiction, some energy storage applications are inhibited until markets and regulatory systems are further developed, so it is presently difficult to achieve the full value of energy storage.

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Geoff James, Principal Research Scientist, CSIRO Energy Technology
Geoff James is a Principal Research Scientist in CSIRO’s Energy Transformed Flagship project. He works with a multi-disciplinary team developing energy storage technologies and applications which are crucial enablers of an efficient electricity grid with increasing renewable energy supply. Geoff received his PhD in Physics (1991) for research in radioastronomy at the University of Tasmania. He then joined CSIRO and until 2002 worked on research and commercial projects in antenna metrology, phase retrieval, antenna analysis and design, electromagnetic theory, and numerical analysis.

Geoff then coordinated research applying multi-agent technology applied in several physical environments. Specialising in distributed energy since 2004, his research interests include demand management, integrating renewable generation, distribution network evolution, and energy storage technology and applications.

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Utility-scale distributed energy storage systems
This presentation will provide a comparative assessment of alternative technology platforms for utility-scale energy storage options and report on the progress of two key international investigations under way in this area:

• The EPRI Energy Storage Systems Project [1]: a co-operation between all major North-American utilities, the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) and the Technology Transition Corporation (TTC) aimed at defining the functional requirements for electricity storage in renewable energy and smart-grid applications; and
• The IEA-HIA Wind-energy and hydrogen integration [2]: an international scientific and technological co-operation program investigating the performance and economics of small-scale and large-scale hydrogen-based storage systems.

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Attilio Pigneri, Technical Director, Energy for GreenCollar Climate Solutions (GCS)

Dr. Attilio Pigneri is the Technical Director at Energy for GreenCollar Climate Solutions (GCS), a Sydney-based global strategic project management services’ consultancy focused on sustainable energy and climate change mitigation.

A professional mechanical engineer from Italy, with Masters and PhD in the energy and environmental areas, Attilio has more than 10 years of professional and academic experience in the broader energy area in Europe, California, China, Australia and New Zealand, with a strong academic and professional focus on strategic planning for the development alternative energy infrastructures and greenhouse gas mitigation initiatives.

Attilio is an alumnus of the Sustainable Transportation and Energy Pathways Program (STEPS) at University of California, Davis and has been an Associate Director at the Centre for Energy Research, Massey University in New Zealand. He sits on the Board of several national and international industry and academic associations and has served as an expert reviewer for the IPCC. 

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Transmission issues for renewables
Aidan will speak on the limitations of the Australian network in regards to implementing renewable projects at both the distribution and transmission level.  Possible methods and actions for moving forward within the industry will also be discussed.

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Aidan Minkevicius, Professional Engineer, Entura
Aidan Minkevicius is a Professional Engineer from Entura (previously Hydro Tasmania Consulting) with five years industry experience.  He has experience in system modelling and secondary design. For the last two years Aidan has been involved in due diligence work for AEMO, performing investigations and system modelling to determine network performance, has investigated the effects of generators on the Australian system, and has conducted some field testing.

Aidan has electrical protection system design experience, performing works for SP AusNet, Queensland Rail, Powercor, Powerlink and Integral Energy.  Previous to beginning work with Entura, Aidan worked for Powercor Networks as a planning engineer and did an internship with Siemens in Germany as a testing engineer.

 

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