Bushveld Minerals Limited’s (LON:BMN) vanadium subsidiary has started testing a battery with South African electricity supplier Eskom, its first deployment in the country.
The vanadium redox flow battery (VRFB) will be deployed at Eskom’s Research, Testing and Development (RT&D) Centre in Rosherville, South Africa.
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Tests will incorporate minimum load shifting, wind generation smoothing, solar generation smoothing, power quality improvement and self-black-start capability.
The VRFB commissioning is expected in the first half of 2018.
Fortune Mojapelo, chief executive, said this was critical stepping stone for both Bushveld Energy and the energy storage market in South Africa.
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Eskom has identified significant energy storage requirements within the South African grid and this project will ensure VRFBs can showcase their superior technical and financial value.
VRFBs seen as cheapest option
VRFBs are among the cheapest of the merging battery storage technologies with costs expected to fall by an additional 66% through to 2030.
South Africa has the world’s second largest reserves of vanadium.