China's National Energy Administration： the formulation of energy storage technology standards is very important

The standardized development of the energy storage industry will welcome the guidance of policy documents. On October 9, the National Energy Administration released the Action Plan for the Improvement of Energy Carbon Peak and Carbon Neutralization Standardization, which listed "speeding up the improvement of new energy storage technology standards" as one of the key tasks. The energy storage industry has frequently pressed the accelerator button recently. In March this year, a document jointly issued by the National Development and Reform Commission and the National Energy Administration proposed that during the "14th Five-Year Plan" period, my country's new energy storage will enter a period of large-scale development from commercialization. BAUFAR understands that the rapid development of the industry presents more challenges for the standard setting work.

Tang Liang, the standard manager of the Zhongguancun Energy Storage Industry Technology Alliance, told Shell Finance reporter that with the explosion of the energy storage industry around 2020, technological innovation is also changing with each passing day, and the standard formulation work often faces the situation that it cannot keep up with the implementation of projects and technological innovation. In the actual work of standard formulation, there are still many difficulties to be solved.

The energy storage industry has ushered in an acceleration, and the formulation of standards still needs to keep up. The "Action Plan" proposes to improve the new energy storage standard management system, combine the needs of new power system construction, and according to the needs of new energy generation grid-connected configuration and the integration of source, network, load and storage, to quickly establish a new energy storage project that covers the construction, production and operation of the whole process. And the standard system of professional and technical content such as safety and environmental protection, technical management, etc.

At the same time, refine the types of energy storage power stations connected to the power grid and application scenarios, and improve the safety design, testing and acceptance standards for access to the power grid system. Accelerate the development of new mandatory national standards for energy storage safety such as lithium battery safety for energy storage and energy storage power station safety. In addition, combined with the innovation of new energy storage technologies and the expansion of application scenarios, the formulation and revision of relevant standards will be carried out in a timely manner to comprehensively promote the coordinated development of R&D, demonstration applications and standard formulation of various new energy storage technologies.

In the field of energy storage, policy documents such as the "14th Five-Year Plan for New Energy Storage Development", "New Energy Storage Project Management Specification (Interim)" and "Notice on Strengthening the Safety Management of Electrochemical Energy Storage Power Stations" have been issued. The Action Plan released this time is in line with the spirit of the aforementioned document. The application scenarios of energy storage are extremely rich. The documents of the National Energy Administration mainly involve energy storage that interacts with the power system, including energy storage applications on the power supply side, grid side, industrial and commercial, and household side.

    The new energy storage to which this NEA document applies refers to new lithium-ion batteries, flow batteries, flywheels, compressed air, hydrogen (ammonia) energy storage, thermal (cold) energy storage, etc., represented by pumped hydro storage. Traditional energy storage is not on the list. Sun Jiawei, senior research manager of Zhongguancun Energy Storage Industry Technology Alliance, mentioned that in 2021, the global new energy storage market will still maintain a rapid growth trend. The new energy storage has the largest scale of new operation, and it exceeded 10GW for the first time, reaching 10.2GW, which is 2.2 times the scale of new operation in 2020, and has broad prospects.

The energy storage industry has recently accelerated frequently. In March this year, the National Development and Reform Commission and the National Energy Administration jointly issued the "14th Five-Year Plan" New Energy Storage Development Implementation Plan, which proposed that my country's new energy storage will enter the period of large-scale development from commercialization during the "14th Five-Year Plan" period. BAUFAR understands that the rapid development of the industry presents more challenges for the standard setting work.

Although China issued the first national standard for the design of energy storage power stations as early as 2014, the National Electricity Energy Storage Standardization Technical Committee was formally established with the approval of the National Standardization Administration Committee in the same year, responsible for the standardization work in the field of electric energy storage nationwide. However, in the early years, the energy storage industry was still in its infancy, with fewer projects and less investment in research in the early stage. Around 2020, the industry ushered in an explosion, and technological innovation was also changing with each passing day. The standard formulation work often faced the situation that it could not keep up with the implementation of projects and technological innovation.

On the other hand of the rise of the industry, the frequent occurrence of energy storage safety accidents around the world in recent years has also caused social concern. According to incomplete statistics from the Zhongguancun Energy Storage Industry Technology Alliance, from 2011 to September 2021, there have been more than 50 energy storage safety accidents worldwide, including more than 30 in South Korea, 10 in the United States, 4 in China, and 3 in Australia. On April 16, 2021, an explosion occurred in the optical storage and charging integration project of Beijing Fuweisi Oil & Gas Technology Co., Ltd. in the South Fourth Ring Road of Fengtai District, resulting in three deaths and one injury. The fire caused direct property losses of 16.6081 million yuan.

In recent years, under the influence of environmental protection policies and incentive policies of various countries, the energy storage industry is moving towards a standardized and orderly direction. At present, the development level of the energy storage industry in all countries in the world is almost the same. However, too much pursuit of innovation and upgrading may make security issues unable to keep up with the speed of product development. This issue must be given enough attention.

From problem recognition to problem solving: What are the difficulties in formulating energy storage standards?

At present, some localities have issued specifications for the construction and operation of energy storage power stations, but there may be differences in local requirements, and manufacturers are often at a loss due to different local standards. "The entire energy storage industry chain involves complex scenarios and requires the cooperation of various departments." According to reports, in addition to the National Energy Administration, the energy storage industry involves the battery industry and requires the supervision of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, and the links involving power station construction and fire protection require the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development and the Ministry of Emergency Management. Supervision, issues involving safety and environmental protection may require the supervision of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, the links involving transportation require the cooperation of the Ministry of Transport, and the assessment of product market access requires the cooperation of the State Administration for Market Regulation. The design of industry standards and the implementation of later standards require various departments. Collaborate to smooth the articulation.

BAUFAR understands that high cost is currently the biggest bottleneck restricting the development of energy storage. Sun Jiawei introduced to reporters that the Alliance has compiled and released the "Guidelines for Economic Evaluation of Electric Power Energy Storage Projects". This group standard clarifies how energy storage participates in different scenarios and services to calculate the benefits, which is intended to calculate energy storage projects for practitioners. Economics provides methodological basis, provides investment decision support for companies intending to invest in energy storage, and helps improve investment efficiency. Sun Jiawei believes that to solve the economic problems of energy storage projects, feasible paths include reducing technical costs, improving energy storage utilization, establishing a new energy storage capacity price mechanism, and innovating revenue sources.