By Kennedy Maize
Large scale battery energy storage systems, once regarded as suspect, have garnered a major place in the U.S. electrical marketplace by making low-cost renewable energy dispatchable while bolstering grid stability.
A major success story for battery storage has come in Texas, where renewable energy is politically incorrect among many of the state’s politicians view natural gas as king as solar and wind are making significant practical strides. As summer gears up – and has already slammed much of the eastern half of the country and some 50% of the U.S. population with a blistering heat wave just after the summer solstice – battery systems may get more chances to strut their electric stuff.
A report last November from the Texas Comptroller concluded, “Battery storage systems have proven their value to the Texas market by increasing reliability and reducing costs while allowing for greater stability in the integration of renewable resources.”
Initial reports on the massive power outage that put Spain and Portugal in the dark for some 10 hours on April 28 blamed the high percentage of solar generation, some 60% of the power to the grid, when nuclear power plants in France failed. A Baker Institute report just days after the event focused on solar as a major factor in the blackout.
The report said, “A central issue lies in the lack of ancillary services, in particular frequency regulation and inertia, which are traditionally provided by synchronous generators in conventional power plants, such as nuclear, thermal, and hydroelectric facilities.’
An earlier Baker Institute report warned that “grid-following inverters” from renewables connected directly to the grid are unable to provide the necessary ancillary services such as frequency control when the big iron fumbles.
Later reports from the Spanish government disputed that analysis, calling out the utilities for poor performance of their thermal plants and poor planning for voltage control.
As solar and wind make energy, battery systems with modern inverters connecting to the grid can provide the needed frequence control, according to several more recent U.S. analyses. In its 2025 State of Reliability, the North American Electric Reliability Corp. found, “Initial evidence suggests battery energy storage systems can improve primary frequency response. BESS in the Texas and the Western Interconnections are contributing to improvements in frequency control and frequency response.”
According to NERC, in 2024  the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, the statewide grid operator, “experienced several instances where batteries provided up to 100% of the total capacity for frequency regulation services. All of these services act cohesively to ensure that additional generation, also known as reserves, is available to compensate for major generator outages, which also enables rapid frequency recovery.”
Battery systems allow solar and wind to provide power when the sun doesn’t shine and the wind doesn’t blow. They can do it on or off the grid. That means they can provide power 24-7, which some customers may need. It also means they are dispatchable. That gives these renewable systems an economic edge over nuclear generation in utility systems that use their non-nuclear generation to follow the routine ups and downs of load.
A study last week (June 21) from the Ember consulting firm concluded, “Rapid advances in battery technology, especially in cost, have made near-continuous solar power, available every hour of every day of the year, an economic and technological reality in sunny regions.”
The Ember study said that battery storage “is a game changer for data centres, factories and remote infrastructure, where grid access is often delayed, restricted, or entirely unavailable. Battery-backed solar offers a fast, flexible way to overcome grid bottlenecks and get clean power online without being held back by the need to build more grid.”
Ember adds, “Grids are becoming a bottleneck for the deployment of clean power sources, with at least 3,000 GW of renewable projects worldwide stuck in grid connection queues – more than five times the total renewable capacity installed in 2024 (585 GW). Batteries can help reduce the need for grid investments.”
How much does a BESS system add to the cost of a solar installation? The Ember report examined hourly solar data from sunny 12 cities. They conclude that pairing 6 GW of solar panels with 17 GWh of batteries yields a steady gigawatt of power 24/7, at a cost of $104/MWh based on 2024 prices, a 22% decrease in a year and cheaper than new coal ($118/MWh) or nuclear ($182/MWh).
A significant downside to BESS systems using lithium ion batteries, generally the technology of choice, is safety. Lithium can catch fire easily and the fires can be difficult to control. Utility-scale BESS fires have been a problem, particularly in California.
The industry is working on this problem, which is crucial for public acceptance. A recent report from the Electric Power Research Institute advocates an open approach to winning community support for locating new BESS systems. “The social license approach—drawing on outreach and engagement methods developed for enabling adoption of new and emerging technologies facing acceptance challenges—is recommended for supporting the siting and permitting of future grid-scale battery storage facilities.”
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