The feasibility study for the first battery energy storage system (BESS) in the central southern African country of Zambia is currently under way, Africa Greenco (Greenco) business development head Wezi Gondwe told delegates at the Enlit Africa conference in Cape Town last month.

Greenco is a Zambian power services company.

The $1-million feasibility study is being funded by the US, and carried out by US- based internationally recognised finance and engineering advisory company K&M Advisors. The feasibility study is covering every aspect of the project, to ensure its optimisation, including its developmental impact on the community where it will be located.

This battery energy storage system project is being developed by a special-purpose vehicle created by Greenco. It will have a capacity of up to 25 MW and a preferred bidder for the contract has been chosen, after a tender process. Greenco is also working with the Zambian regulators to ensure that the project proceeds smoothly and meets all requirements.

“Greenco is an intermediary in the electricity trading space,” explained Gondwe. It came into being because the bankability of Southern African national electricity utilities has been impaired. This has meant that, in Zambia and Zimbabwe, independent power producers, using renewable energy sources, didn’t have routes to the market. Greenco provides them with routes to alternative, diversified electricity markets, including through the Southern African Power Pool.

But the challenge with renewable energy, he pointed out, is intermittency. Solar power usually generates electricity for six to eight hours a day (in Zambia). This intermittency can introduce instability into transmission grids, which can put those grids at risk. In certain seasons, that instability can be severe. Grid balancing power is very expensive.